WD / WD45 Wide Frontend

to my knowledge, the WD only came with the three, and the early WD-45's were 3 bolt, but I don't know where the cutoff came. The reason, as I understand it was the four bolt was stronger

4 bolt wide front end started at serial no. 186413 according to my notes.

I purchase a WD with a wide front to use the wide front for my Dad's old WD (It had a narrow front). I "rebuilt" the threaded mounting holes on the wide front block. Bolt holes were busted out. I used nickle welding rod and filled in the holes, not really knowing what I was doing, I then took it to a machine shop to get new holes and threads cut. No machine shop would touch it because I used regular nickle rod for cast iron. I was informed that I should have used some kind of milling welding rod so the material would be softer to cut. So I tackled the job myself. Bought a handful of drill bits and sharpened them several times. Got the holes drilled finally. Then came tapping the threads. Again I bought two or three taps. Could only go a thread or two before tap wouldn't cut then I would slice off the end of the tap and start again. Repeat until that tap was used up. Grab another tap and so on and so forth. Job got done and twenty sum years later and lots of hay mowed and raked and it has held up fine. I periodically check to make sure the bolts are tight but I did use high strength thread lock and they never have come loose. You can't tell it was ever busted up. Loose bolts is what I think will bust out the threads in the first place.