Hello all, I'm new to writing, but have been reading from these for a while for my old backhoe. Last summer I bought a used Deere ZTX50. It came to me in a state where it wouldn't idle, wouldn't start unless you 'jiggled' the wire behind the seat to the starter solenoid, etc. The tracks had tremendous noise - being steel, but also from lack of maintenance, and the tension on the tracks was taught (incorrect I now know). enough slop in the boom from the elbow to the tip of tooth, that I could get a full 3" of movement moving it back and forth. the carriage had a strange hiccup - it would turn only clockwise as I recall. counter clockwise would stall, and i didn't want to force it so, I just rotated it one direction till I got it lined up to get in the shop. So, I bought it. Seemed like a decent deal! Anyway, here's what I've done: 1) bought the 50ZTS operation and test shop repair manual and the service repair tech manual 2) new engine oil (just drained the old stuff, put in conventional since it's going to be drained again after my repairs are complete), new oil filter 3) new air filters (it was missing the little internal air filter, but that's in there now) 4) bucket work: - all new pins and bushings. turns out you can press the bushings in and out with a hydraulic hole punch. I have a kit made for electricians, and it works great for about 4 ton of pressure. - line bore the thumb pin-holes and new pin, new bushings. 5) took the ROPS off, took off all the sheet metal. - removed the floor metal, the pedals, the engine cowling, etc. I pulled over 70lbs of dirt, grime, grease, etc out of that hollow area under the seat. it's supposed to drain, but was plugged. - I found about 5 lbs of good hardware - bolts, nuts, washers of all sizes. cleaned it up as needed for reinstall. 6) the gearmotor that rotates the carriage above the tracks - take 9 or 10 boles ( can't quite recall). Only two were holding it in place. On had broken off, the others had backed out. The two that were holding the motor were loose, and this is the reason for the screwy lack of both direction turning. I re-aligned that motor, and retapped all the retaining bolt holes. Turns out the bolts were bottoming out on a plate below the motor mount. So I put in a washer or two to keep them from hitting the plate underneath the motor. Put locktite red and torque to spec. 7) replaced all the lower rollers for the tracks. took all the dirt out of the hub motor housing - they were chock full of something like concrete. Had to use an air hammer to clear it all out. Upper rollers were replaced by the previous owner. 8) cleaned all the dirt away from the hydraulic block, reservoir, etc. 9) replaced the hydraulic lines anywhere a check was found. 10) the location where the boom attached to the cab - the cable/hose management was missing, so I took a piece of flat iron, put some vinyl clad conduit over it, and used that to press the lines against the inside of the boom with some retaining bolts. 11) previous owner had a relay to run the glow plugs with a switch rather than letting the timer circuit do it. Immediately removed this. Problem was traced down to the injector pumps themselves. Isuzu 4LE1 engines have a pump per injector. RDO wants $1200 each for these!! I took one apart to see what it was, turns out there's 3 o-rings you can replace that solve the bleed-back issue and makes it so you don't need to use the glow plugs longer than what factory says. this is a great engine that starts wonderfully well, no point in weird hacks. 11.1) new fuel pump, new fuel lines, new crush washers to all the banjo bolts and their connectors. 12) There were several problems with corrosion associated issues in the wiring. the computer was also dead. This isn't the kind of computer that makes the system do anything - it's just a read-sensors type of computer. It's from 2001 after all! Anyway, I fixed the wiring. Track beeper, horn, lights all work. Replaced lights with LED lights - so far so good there. Disabled the track beeper again, that thing is awful. Computer had to be repaired as well. this was a tedious process with a bunch of surface mount crap - I despise this kind of work. 13) put a tachometer on by taking the two curved magnets out of a hard drive and using JBweld to epoxy these to the face of the small crankshaft output on the fan side. I then mounted a sensor for this. Because these were neodymium magnets and not the trash the eBay kit sent, I was able to get signal for my tack at about 1/2" distance. far enough away to make it a safe system. I made a little box to mount the tach right up in front of the computer with a bit of a tilt on it so as to look like the more modern excavators. 14) all the metal parts that came off the top of the deck under the seat and such - they were all Rhino lined top and bottom. gives good traction in the wet, but holds dirt more. need to pressure wash more. Found out what the meaning of Volatile Organic Vapors - specifically isocyanates. Don't spray this stuff without PPE!! I got flu-type sick for nearly a week after spraying this without PPE - outside! 15) greased the hard to get to zircs under that floor, then figured out there's an access panel for them! 16) greased the whole machine well - and found every zirc the multitude of pages in service manual told me about. had to replace 4 zircs. 17) repainted much of the carriage with JD yellow. bought some new decals, cleaned the boom of all it's grease, removed the RDO decals, put on new deere stickers, happy with how it looks. can't find 50ZTX decals, so I made my own at a sticker shop by taking in a vector image i made -it's very obviously zifferent than what was stock, but the stock sticker looked childish to me, so this looks much more the way I'd think JD would do it. 18) I just ordered new tracks and sprockets. Going to take the tracks off and see what's going on with the idler and tensioner before I buy new parts. so the point of me giving a list of the high-point maintenance work is to say this is what's been done. Now... I didn't open the engine, it seems fine, starts great, idles beautifully, runs up to 2200 rpm no issue, I'm quite pleased with it. The excavator works VERY well, other than detracking once in a while - the tracks are well past needing replacement according to the service manual, but I've been using it with no issue. it's got good power, the pushing power is less than I'd like, but I can backfill just fine, so that makes sense. Now the carriage wobbles a little - I notice it, but I don't think it's terrible. all the rotring bolts are in places inside and outside - I felt all of them. I'm just not interested in replacing this if I don't actually need to - it's just for myself as a home owner. It's not leaking anywhere now - well there's a slow leak under the reservoir, but I am not overly worried about it - it's a drip every 8 hour of use, and it's just not interesting for me. if you have worked on these - Deere 50ZTS or Hitachi 50U machines - can you tell me if I've overlooked anything? I'm sure I'll run into problems as i use it, but.. if you can point out - hey look at this and prevent failure this way - that would be great!
Welcome to the HEF! Good to have you. I ain’t reading all of that. How about a little ****-chat first? How’s the weather in Montana?
yeah, the last two paragraphs are my actual question -it's working - but should I be wary of something on these? weather is good -pretty warm for this time of year - around 10F in the say, -10F at night. Last year at this time, we hat -40 to -50, so it's rather tame right now. hardly any snow - only about a foot on the ground. been clear at night, cloudy in the day. still, the ground is soft, it's easy to move the little ex around and it can push trees over just fine. so it makes clearing the trails pretty easy! I don't know where North of the 60 is, but what's it like there?
oh, north of the 60th parallel. wow, now that's north!
South-Central is freakishly warm. The entire winter has been weird. Pensacola Florida has more snow than Wasilla. Post some pictures of this beast. Sounds like you have put some time and effort into this project.
I recently screwed up my PC, so right now I don't have my pictures during most of the rebuild - I'll see if I can find those on an SD card or something somewhere. Anyway, here's a pic of it after it's able to be fully tested. You can see the ROPS cage is missing, the new decals, the raptor liner on the floor plates. It's not a great detail, but there's new control joysticks there too. Anyway, it's my first, and very likely only, excavator. it's been great, and I'd like to make it last as long as possible. the computer failed with 2900 hours or so on it. it's running again, so, it's telling me it's still under 3k hours, which.. yeah, I don't know. some of the damage/wear makes me think it's closer to 4k hours but then... what do I really know?
well, crap, you can't edit. it's a 2001 John Deere 50ZTS mini excavator. not what was stated earlier.
That’s a good looking hoe! Within a certain period of time, you can click on the left bottom of the text box and edit.
That's a lot of work you did to your machine, nice job and it looks great!
thanks much. I'm very happy with the machine. Just posting because my knowledge on these is so limited. Made sense to ask for some pointers.
Yes, lots of work you did. The small oil leak you have, do you know what's leaking? In most cases small miniscule leaks turn into bigger leaks over time. I'd suggest with all the work you've done it would be be good to fix that leak. You forget about it and the next thing your hydraulics are getting hot because the hyd. oil is low.
it's seeping either through the threadlock or the seal of the lower hose (2") on the hydraulic reservoir. I cleaned out about 10-15lb of crap from that area, then washed and dried it out - drained the oil while I was there. didn't find the leak till after new oil was in it, and it had ran several hours. Only found it because i pulled all the panels again for an after-testing inspection to see what else may be wrong. I'm not really excited about fixing that one till it's time for new hydraulic fluid. I'll probably do that in about 500-600 hours which is way sooner than needed, but that's better than way too late.
Looks good . I see you say you removed the rops. May want that back on before you knock too many trees down.
okay, I've got a few more pics - just went out and took them since it's sunny enough. ROPS is back on, it's fully assembled except the engine hood which I've got in a friends shop - i just need to finish fixing the cracks and repaint it. So, end of the stick to the quick attach - new pins, bushings, seals, and plastic shims replaced the metal shims. got it really tight with the plastic shims. The thumb is Rhino lined on the backside, and has been line bored. the previous owner bent the thumb pin a little and egg-shaped the holes. fixed now. next up: Upper pins replaced with new shims, the lower one got new shims, bushings and pins. That one was a hell of a thing to replace! I can't figure out formatting, so the rest of the text goes here. I made a hydraulic line retainer from some flat iron and a pice of reinforced conduit. puts pressure without sharp edges on the lines. keeps them from dragging, so far so good. Next pic is my tachometer - JD didn't include a tach on these! I like a tach, so I had to place it. you can only upload 4 pics at a time.
okay, more pics: First is the tachometer pickup. Second is the injectors. each one was spray painted so I could get them right back in the exact spot - only one pulled at a time. Not sure it is this 'critical', but you know, thought I'd be careful. I *had* this engine somewhat clean - the oilpan was still greasy, but the dirt all over the block almost kept me from loading this. It's from using it in the winter - the duff/forest loam I'm working in is dusty as can be, and it seems to get all over everything - me included. comes off with a pressure washer fine - which will happen when it's warmer out. by the way, the oil slick you see on the block below the dipstick is sorted. the original dipstick leaked, but the OEM one doesn't. special order part out of Japan. nothing local would fit it. RDO had one, but their pricing was 4X that of the special order from Japan via Amazon.
Now, I've got an issue - this seal pops out constantly. I've put it back about 3 or 4 times now, and it only goes so far. I've cleaned the groove with a q-tip, and nylon brushes. Problem is - if you grease the bearing, and turn the machine when it's cold - *pop* goes the weasel, or seal in this case. it just gets shoved out by cold grease. This is what JD calls the Swing Bearing. Does anyone know the part number for the seal? 2001 Deere 50 ZTS.
Seal # 4345371 subs to # 4345154 .
wow, thanks much. I'll take these down to the local RDO and see what the cost will be.
I've fixed that seal, and have recently bought an Ice Ripper to work with this machine. I'd been considering one for a while, but seeing a good example of one of these in operation pushed me over the edge. This is a Mongo, I got it 'used' but other than some paint missing, I can't see what's used about it. Tooth is great, no undue wear, no stress cracks. Works REALLY nice, ripped 4 stumps in the time it would normally take for one, pulled out many rocks, one about the size of a v8 block. Those really slow me down with a bucket, but this curved tine just slips underneath and 'plucks' out stumps or rocks, whatever. So far, very happy! the new issue I have - have to be very careful unfolding and folding up the wrist/boom. that tooth is a LOT longer than either bucket I have!
the seal is an issue because the rotek is getting loose, as you mentioned before. That ripper is the bee's knees, the cat's meow, just the ticket. A ripper is a superb force multiplier as you are finding out.
well, the original seal was 20 years old too. The rotec seems to be 'OK', and for a home user, it'll be fine. If I put another 3k hours on it over the next 10 years, it'll be pretty good.
On a lot of backhoes you have to watch when you pull the stick in and curl the bucket for transport so you don't hit the boom with the bucket teeth. Some even weld an extra plate on the bottom of the boom to prevent denting the boom with ghe bucket teeth.
I may have to do that. I have a new foot long scar/deep scratch along the inside of the boom arm. I'm still a 'meh' operator, and I like to do multiple operations at the same time. with small/stock buckets, I typically unfurl the bucket while also unfolding the dipper arm. Damnit! That's a hell of a scratch. thinking I may cover the whole underside of the boom in RhinoLiner. I'm going to have a weld a box to protect the exposed hydraulic cylinder and it's lines on the boom to body connection. I have a tendency to pin stumps, rocks, whatever, against the boom - this was learned on my backhoe which is fully protected and this behavior seems expected. will probably just weld nuts to the edge steel and go over to Pacific and have them roll some steel into an appropriate arc. put some holes in that and bolt it up.
I know im late to the party on this. I have a deere 50D anyone know where I can get the complete tool box cover for it? Deere says they are discontinued.
Should have started a new thread. Probably need to look for a used one or have one made.
if you can't get one from Deere, and you can't get one from a wrecking yard... then you either make one yourself, or you go to a fab shop. I'm getting a mid-sized plastic printer for just this issue. looks like the epoxy printers are better detail, but parts aren't that strong. the ones that have a print head that melts the trimmer line look suitable for strong(er) parts.
Could you recommend a wreaking yard i could try. Not much here in Northern Ms.Dont mind used. I would pay you laidback for a plastic one. Im sick of freaking mice making a home in it.
See if your JD dealer is part of the used parts network where they can check with other dealers for used parts.
I have a 50ZTS which is likely about 10 years older than a 50D. I'm rather doubtful the toolbox covers are the same. mine is a 2001. the 50ZTS doesn't have the different parts for different years issue like the 50D either. I see when you look up parts for that, the early serial numbers reference Remarks 8099559 NLA,ORDER 8103069, ALSO ORDER 7049647 for the toolbox cover and the later models refer to: 8113134 and they are very different from each other and also very different from mine. I'll ask our local shop here in Kalispell, MT if they have a source for 50D parts. Will post back in a few days - I don't go to town that much. A quick search for used deere parts brings this company up: https://amsparts.com/john-deere/50d/excavator/parts I really don't know anything about them though.
Thanks !
I was at Reddig's today, and they have a 50G in the lot for sale, but he rather chuckled at the idea of getting cab parts for a 50D or 50C. Too old, "everything worth getting has been!" he states. Now, we are a low population area, so there's not likely to be a lot of these in the old equipment salvage yards here. Anyway, that's all I know! Good luck. I think you might just get one bent out of sheet metal by a steel shop... Pacific will put steel sheet in their brake for me and bend when I need it. it was inexpensive for me at the time I needed it, I recall a couple bucks being added for a couple bends. Probably more now.
$1 a bend seems unbelievable. Press brakes aren't cheap.
If they give you a good deal if you buy the sheet, great!
Found another problem. Makes sense though - 3000 hours on the machine, it wasn't super well taken care of from new. Used a heavy plate compactor for preparing the hole for septic tanks mostly. That vibration is what backed out most of the bolts on this machine, what made it need new pins and bushing so soon, etc. Anyway, was using it the other day, have a grand time! And smelled coolant on exhaust. well, crap! so I shut it down and got out to look. Coolant all over the engine, the bay, dripping on the ground etc. I let it cool, refilled the tank, and get it back to my shop. So it's coming apart now. and it's a good brand radiator, and as it turns out copper! Well, that's fantastic! I can fix this. play with it in a water bath looking for air leaks, I found only the one after a fairly intense search. You can see the crack - it's running vertically with the tube nearest the white marks. So, today, I'm going to let it warm up a bit (that's frost on the fins), clean the paint off, and do some soldering. well, cool, I'm good with this! I'll get another pic up when it's all back together.
well, I'm taking it to a professional shop. I fixed the one leak and promptly found two more in the bath. I think it's best if someone else works on this.
If yours is like mine you have to RELIGIOUSLY clean out the rad and cooler .once fixed. Especially in between terrible design.I made a curved hose attachment and gently spray.A pain trying to do that between fan blades
yeah, I think my radiator will need to be re-cored. No looking forward to that expense, but... I need the excavator more than i need the excuse of not having it. As to keeping it clean, I have a little window screen material that use magnets to hold on the frame of radiator. works good for larch needs and larger. no use for dust.. but I have pretty dcent access on this machine to push water through from the fan side. I've seen the engine bay for the 50Ds, they are a bit more compact. The 50 ZTS I have is the original model, and they really hadn't refined everything yet. so it's not as compact as your setup. Which is OK with me as I don't need to worry about it. Even so, they cram a lot of stuff into that 'engine bay' (more like a heat trap coffin) but the cooling system seems to work pretty well.
Laidback01, looks like somewhere along the line you have pick up some handy skills. I like how you installed the tach. Owning any machine for me even new ones seems to be a constant job of upkeep and repair/ replace. From exhaust parts rust and rotting out, to radiators needing work just like yours, brakes needing replaced, throwing tracks at the worst time, to everything in between, it is constant work and money to keep going. Greasing is a daily job and is worth the effort and time it takes. A well greased machine wears at a much slower rate. It is a never ending job thats eats your time with the reward being you have a machine to use and do things you want done. I have often wondered about the 1000s of machines that went down and stopped working due to owners stopping repairs for lack of money, time or just tired of battling wear and tear. If you have time i would like to hear more of your techniques for tracking down the electrical gremlins. Keep up the good work!
Turns out that radiator needed to have the tube "cut and plugged" as it sounds like the one fix I made was what the professional would term a temporary fix. The other leaks I thought I found, he could not... I must have just have had aggravation-imagination working against me. So, this will not cost that much, which is cool, but the really good news is that Howard states my radiator withstands 15 psi just fine now that the crack has been cut out and filled with silver solder. Good deal! Anyone know where to get that engine foam? I pulled a pile of it out of there (carefully) while I was working, but... a lot of it is worthless, completely soaked in various oils and coolant. it's not drying, and it's gritty. I'm thinking that I could cover the radiator in wax paper and use expanding foam - minimal expansion type I think and fill in all the gap areas with that. It's closed-cell foam which won't hold dirt/oils as easily, and hey, it's bright yellow, so it'll match. Anyway, is dried expansion foam OK to replace the other engine bay foam? Any major fire hazard more than the other foam? anything else I need to think of? @Georgia Iron Thanks for the compliment. Means a lot coming from folks like you! I look at some of the stuff you've done and it's really impressive! I sorted out a while back that maintenance is actually an exercise that calms me down. It's a way to help me understand the machine too - be it whatever equipment. As I continue, I'll update this thread or whatever with information. thanks much! Have a good day.
I prefer the neoprene foam for gaps and such but the expanding foam should work. For engine heat and sound deadening, you can’t beat Dynomat and it oil resistance is pretty good.
Radiator is back in my hands now. $140 later, not too bad! Guy did a really nice job. Radiator holds 15psi for an hour, and he told me the radiator looked really good overall. minor amount of sediment in the bottom tank, little bit of goop came out overall. he cut out a good chunk of the tube that had the crack and then soldered (lead based) all the way along that. I should have ordered the foam earlier, but I bought 3/4 neoprene foam from Amazon, it should be here shortly. I'll have to sort out some cleanup before I worry about final assembly since i'm waiting on the foam.
okay, I just dumped the final drive (propel motor) oil. the left side track has dark oil with sparkly small content. I can take a magnet and swirl it in the oil. were this a little 3.5hp engine, I'd toss it as "going bad". This is a planetary gear set, so ... maybe it's just part and parcel. There's no power loss detected (yet), and I just put in some new API GL-5 90W gear oil in both sides. The right hand side has some glitter in it, but the oil is still nice and clear. Now, this is only my second oil change since getting the machine - possible I'm still cleaning the crap out of it by driving around. my question here - because I'm concerned, I'm thinking a rebuild kit for these might be nice. I see they sell brand new propel motors for about $2k each. well, that's spendy! I was hoping to be able to find a rebuild kit. Any of you ever rebuilt your propel motors? No matter what, I'd be doing both of them as a set and not just one. If I have to buy them... way it goes I guess. with regard to buying new/rebuilt motors - have any of you used and had good outcomes with https://www.finaldrivemotors.com ?
Those mini digger finals soon turn old looking after a service. I’m told it’s pretty normal.
okay, good to know, thanks much!
I had to replace the slewing bearing/rotek in it. Had that done professionally. Wow, what a difference this makes to the machine, SO much more confidence while using it.
I'm going to put in some actual dial gauges. Looking at this crappy computer that JD put on here, it's got this goofy digital bar meter for temp. I'd rather have a plumbed fitting with a real gauge to tell me things like current draw, coolant temp, hydraulic oil temp, I'm not sure I could get pressure gauges in there, but the temp gauges make the most sense to me anyway. And I'm going to put in a draw fan on the pump side, holy cow does this thing get hot! Here's a photo of some work done these last few days, and wow, I was at 3/4 temp the hole time. Took the hood off, and presto, down to half the bar-gauge. no idea what temp it is - just half the stupid bar gauge. It's been raining today, will rain a bit more tomorrow, rather light rain, but I'll have time to put the plate compactor on and go to town on it. all a learning experience!
How much did that cost?
Slewing bearing was just a bit over $2k from ConEquip. Problem is I also had pins and bushings done on the horsehead, the thrustwasher is new, new hydraulic metal lines imported from Japan (made by Hitachi) - for the lower main hydraulic. Had to buy new bolts for the rotek from JD as well; they are spendy! Everything said and done, I'm into it another $7k or so. But, I'm super happy with it, so whatever, worth it to me. I've got a few more mods to do for cooling, some temp gauges, and this thing will be right there for my needs!