Hi! I just bought a 2wheel 580E yesterday (yea!) thats been well used (boo). Motor and FEL are pretty good, but the backhoe needs all new pins and bushings, cylinders resealed, and worst of all, one of the swing tower's swing cylinder holes is wallowed out. It either needs welding up or replacing. I'd like to remove the entire hoe section to disassemble it and rebuild. To move the parts around etc, it makes sense to me to use the 580 as a loader. The manual says to bolt on a rear counterweight (1400lbs) if you remove the hoe. Pretty hard to find a rear counterweight actually. Heres my question - could I remove the front counterweight (900lbs), attach it some how to the back of the machine (chains?), and get on with using it ONLY as the heavy lifter to help in disassembly? I'm doing this all in an open field (future home site) and only have what I can lug there to help me out. Or does anyone have a better suggestion on how to do this? (paying someone else, ah...not if I dont have to) Thanks for any help!
Welcome to HEF, mani ! Yes you could remove the front weight and chain it to the rear of the tractor. You will be limited as to how much weight the loader will pick up tho. In regards to removing the backhoe be very careful injury or death is a real possibility ! Lay the hoe flat out and block it up before unhooking any hoses. Next it is very important that you block the backhoe frame so it extremely stabil. DO NOT rely on the boom and stabilizer cylinders to hold the backhoe frame in an upright position when it is separated from the tractor frame.
Yes blocking for sure. The boom cylinder wont hold up the back of the tractor at all after the spool is released, so I'm guessing its shot.....tho I suppose it could be the spool too. I dont know. None of the cyls or spools are leaking externally, so I take that as a plus.
Welcome to the hoe family... Tinker is alluding to the weight of the hoe itself. It can easily weigh 4000 pounds for the hoe alone. Blocking is critical to your safety. Once something starts to fall, there's no stopping it short of a wood block on the ground. Don't use concrete blocks. They will shatter when your life depends on them. My collection of wood blocks could double as a firewood pile for the Winter. You're doing this in an open field ? Do you have power available ? A welder and grinder are a great help working the bushings & pins. This is not auto mechanics. The heavy in heavy equipment is serious stuff.
I have been a mechanic in another life and am now a field engineer for a major car manufacturer. I have had to buy bigger, wrenches, sockets and hammers to work on my Cat.
Ok, thats good put. Thanks. I work on cars, trucks, and airplanes, so sure this is going the other way in weight. My first take was to start at the bucket end and take off and fix as I go (per the service manual), but I'd need some kind of gantry crane or other heavy lifting device as well. Then I signed on and posted here, thinking the complete way would be better. But thats why I asked. Yes I'll be able to "borrow" power from a neighbor, and keeping the whole project mobile would make that easier in that respect. I have welders (yes plural) and grinders, and such. I'm not tracking with how they would be useful getting the pins and bushing out. Can you explain what you alluding to please?
Welding three beads inside the length of a bushing shrinks the OD. Sometimes the shrinkage when cool, is enough, the bushing falls out of the bore. Otherwise the press fit bushing are a **** to remove. Fabricating tools and fixtures in place of OEM shop tools is another use.
Copy the tool fab. But the bushing trick, thats a winner! Thanks for that. One of the swing arm holes in my swing tower is wallowed out (ie ovaled, no bushing to be seen clearly in years). Any thoughts on just welding the hole back to size and rebushing it?
Welding a bore back to size is a job for line boring. Since you're going to take the hoe apart, a machine shop can do the job more efficiently.
I have a quick attack hoe. It will creep down when off so I put a stand under it however putting a chain connecting the 2 stabilizer legs together would also stop it from collapsing. I stretch the boom right out and curl the bucket all the in but you could curl it out too. Then you're not relying on hyd's. to hold it up. I put split tension bushings in the swing tower and finally tried the hoe out today. Seemed to work fine but forgot to look real close at the bushings. They are good if your bore isn't perfectly round or wallowed out too bad. You can be up to .006" oversize. I also used Loctite 660 with the bushings. The nice thing with the split tension bushings is you don't have to grease them. I did spray dry graphite on them though. http://herculesca.ca/home.php?cat=17178&page=1
Split bushings, Nice thanks, I'll keep that in mind. Line boring, yeah I hear you, that would be optimal, but I have the time to do this judiciously with hand tools - files if need be, because this is now my personal machine, not a hard core work machine - lets call it a retired classic..... I still need it to accomplish its function, but I can work with its arthritis to get it done...FWIW, I am a machine shop, but not capable of hosting the swing tower on my equipment. I'll keep alignment foremost in mind. Thanks for the emphasis! Hopefully this pic atchs, but this is what I'm looking at needing fixing. Very much appreciate your comments so far guys - its all new to me. Pls forgive any "stupid" questions.
I thought you were talking about the boom on the swing post not a cylinder mount on the swing post. I think you could cut or grind the hole bigger and weld a new bushing in. Hole for a weld in bushing wouldn't have to be super precise.
Good, thats kinda what I'm thinking - cut something on the lathe, weld it in so it fits the factory Case bushing and pin inside...tho I'll have a better handle whether its that, or just a few beads on the inside of oversized area, then grind it round again. But either way it'll have to line up without binding the pin, thats true. I dont know if the bottom hole is also wallowed beyond the bushing yet. BTW the boom pin and bushing are sloppy and need replaced as well, but the bushing isnt missing like it is here, so I'm hoping for just a bushing/pin job there. Incidentally, anyone know the bushing wall thickness? Just curious - I havent bought any parts yet.
mani, find your bushing in the online parts store. Then select it and a box will pop-up with the dimensions in mm. You will find that Ando posted a lot of good information in his Basket Case thread. It is here ---> HeavyEquipmentForums
Um....ok, sorry, I'm a bit behind the curve here....to which online parts store are you referring? Is there one connected with this website that is the go to?....... or just any googled parts store? Thanks on the link for the basket case....I'll scour that for good ideas!
https://partstore.casece.com/us/parts-search.html#epc::mr7985739
Near the bottom of the page you can convert the parts list, from a list of parts to thumbnails (pictures of the parts). Also in the upper RH corner is a green bar that will expand the page to to a full screen view.
Oh! Very cool. Thanks for this gents. Of course, the first thing I looked for is an obscure part - a hard line that has split and is pissing hydraulic fluid all over the inside of the right tire. I think I can actually make this line if I need to (I have a JIC flare tool). Any one know the wall thickness of our steel lines? This one is the fattest diameter, with what I believe is a 1 1/2" nut and flare on either end. Its part D93297 called "Tube power beyond port of stabilizer control valve to backhoe control valve" which is description that makes no sense to me.
It could be welded by brazing it.
Sounds like a large diameter line. I've replaced a leaking hardline with a hose with suitable ends. Just support the hose as needed. Easy to do.
I got the floor boards up to get to the tubing nuts on this leaking hard line. They are 1.5" nuts and are a bugger tight. No joy with the wrench handle lengths I had on hand. I know JIC nuts are thin walled, but I've not got a lot of room to work, so can I add some heat to these nuts to break them free? Propane or acetylene? FWIW, on airplanes we typically do 1/4 to 1/2 turn on JIC nuts and they are seated, but thats almost always with AL tubing, not steel. These have got to be on with 80ftlbs or better, factory work.
I have never had to heat a tubing nut. And, I have dealt with some stupid tight ones. If you have room, get a longer cheater pipe on the wrench. Pounding on the flats of the nut sometimes helps. Once in a while I have actually put pressure on the wrench in the clockwise direction and it seemed to help break it loose. If you do resort to heat be careful not to get the tube tooo hot or it will twist and look like a spring.
I have found that calling your local Case dealer and having them look up the old numbers can definitely pan out. Lots of time the online search says that it is no longer made by Case, but, the dealer can see if there are any left in the network on another dealers shelf, and most of the time they find it for me.
Welcome to HEF, Sheb ! Good info for those that don't know that.