Widen Tractor Stance Kama 554

[3RRL]

Hi,
After much work at the property, I decided to widen the front tires on my Kama 554. It was easy to do by lifting up the front of the tractor using the fel bucket and blocking it up. I figured it would give me more stability working my property which has severe slopes, rocks and other obstacles that I tread over.
Here are comparison photos showing the difference before and after. In each picture, I lined up the fel from front to back so the vantage point is the same.
It made quite a difference in stance.



The fronts, being loaded were a lot heavier than I anticipated. The rears are also loaded, they are going to weigh a ton. I will need to bring a hydraulic jack and figure out some way to stabilize the tires without laying them down. Otherwise I may never get them back up. They will require to have the inner hub swapped around so it's a little more work than just rolling the tire to the other side. They also have the wheel weights on the hubs so that in itself is going to be kind of heavy to muscle around. I'm not as fit as I used to be.
Rob-

[3RRL]

I was concerned about placing more stress on the bearings, especially doing heavy loader work. However, after reading several posts where other's have done it and gained stability. Even Tommy at Affordable, I believe, said he sets all his tractors' stance out wide like that. I thought it was worth it, considering how and where I use my tractor. At this point, safety for myself is my number one concern and any amount of additional stability I gain is really important in my case. I've already used the tractor to such an extent that it has more than paid for itself. So If I do have a failure, I'll repair it and not think twice about it. I'll just have to watch and keep an eye on it.

Here are comparison photos again, showing the entire front stance before and after. Again taken from the same spot and lined up the same. I didn't measure the difference, but would estimate my stance widened by over 8".



Want to know something interesting?
I read where some were concerned about the turning radius increasing a lot. Surprisingly, I found that my turning radius actually decreased! I made the same turn over and over again before widening my fronts in this one spot where I had to avoid a boulder. So I used my turning brakes to help me make the turn. I found after widening the fronts, the tractor crawled itself better through the same turn and did not have to use the turning brakes. I am always in 4 wheel drive so maybe that's the difference, but it seemed ... no ... it actually pulled itself through the turn more positively and sharply than before. Before, the fronts would kind of grab/skid a little but now they just grab and pull into the turn much better. This is what I experienced.
Rob-

[3RRL]

Anyway, I got the rears done this weekend with the help of Loretta. She is a trooper and got really into it. As usual, there are a lot of photos for this simple, but important (to me) alteration. I started by breaking out my brand new Harbor Freight hydraulic kit I purchase last week. First thing I did was fill the cylinder with AW 32 and then put together the parts for jacking up.



Then I put a wood plank on the dirt so the jack would not bury itself into the dirt and started jacking it up. For safety, I also had a wood 4 x 4 in case the cylinder failed and also chock blocked the fronts. The 10 ton cylinder works great, lifting the Huge Kama easily, one side at a time.



You saw photos of the fronts earlier comparing the difference, so here is one from the rear showing that the rears are a little narrower than the front. When I switched the fronts, they must have moved out about 4" each, because they are super wide now.

When the tractor was shipped to me, the rear valve stems were on the inside. I didn't consider doing both at the same time, but I could've switched them so the valve was on the outside. I thought it was safer to do one at a time with the set up I had, and live with the stem inside. Plus there is lots of room to get in there now.



Rob-

[3RRL]

Next step was to crack all the lug nuts loose while the tire was still touching the ground.



I had put the tractor in neutral withe the parking brake off and the differential lock off also, so that I could spin the tire if I wanted to. Normally I would have the parking brake on, but since it is broken right now anyway, that's what I did. When I tried to spin the tire, it did but only 1/3 revolution before it felt like it stopped pretty solid. So I wonder how much force is needed to get one to slip? I know they do when I use the turning brakes, but it felt pretty solid to me so I didn't push it.
That's also why I blocked up the other tires. Also, unlike a car where the suspension allows the body and frame to move vertically a lot before the tire comes off the ground, the tractor has no suspension. It comes off the ground right away with only the tire deflection from weight being the factor.
These are the 2 wheel weights that were on each rear. I didn't weigh them, but I figure together they must be around 130 lbs per side.

[3RRL]

After getting the wheel weights off, I could then manage the tire and wheel easily. I figure I had at least 20 gallons of fluid in the rears so they were a little heavy, but definitely not unmanageable. I didn't try to press them over my head though. However, with the wheel weights on later, I could definitely feel the weight difference. They were a lot heavier with the weights on, so maybe the wheel weights were heavier than I thought?



Here is the right wheel well after getting the tire off. I inspected the area now that I could "see" in there and noticed that on the axle housing, where it is bolted to the rear end, there was one bolt missing. That missing bolt was on the horizontal centerline towards the front of the tractor. It appeared to me there was no tapped hole for the bolt to go into, so I'm wondering if all KM554's are like that? Right behind it is where the brake lever is, so maybe it is on purpose? No picture of course, but you guys with the KM554's might check this for me. I also forgot to check the left side to see if it was the same.
Later, Chip from Artrac informed me that was normal, that it was a locating hole or something, but nothing to worry about.

[3RRL]

Next step was to remove the center hub from the rim. This turned out to be a little more difficult than it looked. The center hub fits into the rim on 6 "ledges" that center it up to the rim. They are not perfect so the hub was "squeezed" onto the rim ledges. I had to take sledge hammer to knock them out! Same problem during the re-assembly. After flipping the hub around, I had to take a pry bar to fit the hub onto those ledges. What I did was put the nuts and bolts in and started to tighten them a little. Then I would pry the rim (which flexed) so the ledges went over the hub diameter. Before doing that, make sure the holes line up too. I used Loctite on all the nuts and bolts.
Then Loretta took over from there. lol ... she is younger than me (by 1 month)



She made it a lot easier on me, especially when she handed me nuts and bolts from the other side of the tire. Very much so when I had to put the wheel weights back on the rims before mounting the tires. I noticed the bolts that held on the weights were loose and I found out why. When I tightened and Loctite them, they did not fit the bolt circle of the wheel weights. So I had to loosen them to fit the wheel wights on, and then tighten them up. That was a small pain to do, because the wheel weights are heavy and there are two of them per wheel. I ended up putting the wheel weights on the inside of the hubs.



And of course when she did the wrenching herself. (I did torque them to the point of stretching the bolts so they "pinged" when tightened. Now I know they are tight.)



There was some discussion about having the wheel weights on the inside for more stability and I thought it would be more stable, closer to center of gravity. Later, Brad confirmed my suspicion.
This is what he wrote:
The center of gravity of the 2 wheel weights is at the center of the axle and the height of the hubs no matter how far they are apart.
I think Rob is right though about them being better closer to the center. That will make the moment of inertia of the weights smaller. If your wheel hits a bump while traversing a slope that means less momentum to carry the tractor over. It should also ride smoother.
Like when you have a lot of weight in the FEL even with the loader close to the ground it gives you a large moment of inertia because it is so far from the center of the tractor. As a result it will bounce like crazy if you go too fast.
Another example is the backhoe. You could stretch it out straight across the ground to lower the center of gravity but you keep it stowed tight to the tractor instead because the moment of inertia is terrible - the tail wags the dog (not to mention the tail smacking into things)

Hope that helps,
Brad

[3RRL]

Here you can see the right tire with the wheel weights on the inside now.
I could've left the wheel weights on the hubs when flipping the them, but trying to get the hub into the rim, over those ledges would have been a monster task. I was already fatigued from the day before when I had to repair several places and then hand shoveled about 700' of dirt to bury the exposed polypipe that kept rupturing due to the heat!. Talk about a work out!

As it turned out, it was easier to remove them for re-assembly than trying to pick up all that weight of the hub and weights and fit it into the rim. Plus I know now that the weight bolts are tight and Loctiteted too.



Below, you can see the right wheel moved out and compare it to the left one which is not done yet. There is a lot more room between the wheel well fender now, making it easier to get to the valve stem for airing up or down. This right one took us almost 2 hours to do! I was very cautious though, trying to anticipate problems if I dropped the tire or wheel weights, and that's what made it take so long.



Below shows how the rears are now directly in line with the fronts.
I have always felt the tractor should be set up this way, both fronts and rears being the same width, regardless of wide or narrow stance. It seems to be the most stable platform.



Here is a view from the front too, showing how the stance is equal front to back. I tried to measure the width and it is about 78" wide now. There seems to be approximately 3" per side that my 7' (84") box blade still sticks out per side.



Rob-

[3RRL]

Well, here is (almost) the end of my story. Sorry to drag it out so long...
As you can see, Huge Kama is even Huge'er now. The rear stance is impressively wide.



Here is another shot from the rear left side. I took the tractor out for a spin and I could feel the difference in stability right away. It was very noticeable even on the dirt road. I later took it into the meadow over some gullies where I experienced the dreaded "pucker factor" before widening the tires out. There was still that sensation, but I noticed it was not nearly the same as before. So in my opinion, I have gained some stability, which was what I was after.



I also got a chance to wash big Kama up a little too. He is still quite handsome to me.



Rob-

[3RRL]

I mowed my food plot this weekend and some of the steep slope across the gully. I did not even realize it until I was almost done, but last year I was pretty nervous on this slope. With the tractor having a wider stance all around, it felt really, really stable and solid. I did not suffer the dreaded "pucker factor" at all. It wasn't until I was done that I realized what it felt like last year, when I started to think about it. This is a real life example of a wider stance having much more stability than before.

It may not look too steep, but it is. The road in the background is a good 30' or 40' above the gully.



Rob-

[bracabric]

Great job Rob as always, and very well documented. I shall do the same with my Jinma 354 one of these days as I have some quite sharp slopes to contend with. Never occurred to me that you could put the weights inside the wheels, great stuff!!

Dick

[quikduk]

3rrl said:

I also got a chance to wash big Kama up a little too. He is still quite handsome to me.



Rob-

WOW!!! That is the cleanest I have ever seen that thing! ;D

[3RRL]

Yeah, not bad for pushing 500 hours now.
Once a year I bathe it using a drip dry liquid wax.

lol ... Do you think yours will ever see 500 hours?
Yours might see 500 waxings before that ever happens ;D...hahaha.
Just pulling your leg Ken, I know how immaculate you keep DogHouse.
Rob-