When you're working alone and the skid steer dies, use a bigger loader This skid steer blew a return line to the tank while scraping the barn and dumped the entire hydraulic reservoir. I used the forks on our Komatsu WA180 to pick it up and move it. First I moved it over to our wash station to clean a years worth of manure off of it. Then into our shop so I can tear into the belly and find the blown hose. Window on the big loader is filthy from dust and a slight drizzle earlier. And yes, I do know there are bypass screws on the pump drive for towing, but why screw with that when you can pick it up and carry it.
When the idiots replaced a drive motor in mine, they failed to properly tighten the hyd. filter. Lasted maybe 15 minutes before it loosened enough for the fluid to get pumped out. Thankfully just before it lost the fluid I had it idling as I got out to check the grade. I got back in, revved it up and went about 15ft. and then nothing. I saw oil so shut it off right away. I didn't want to work on it there but I had an idea. I stuck the back end in my track loader. I wasn't quite able to lift the whole machine but lifted the wheels enough I could drag it backwards on the bucket. I thought a hose right behind the filter blew so took it off and it looked OK. Just out of curiosity I grabbed the filter and it turned easily. I should have went back to that damn place and got them to replace the 2 pails of new oil I just paid for. They also ground the self tapping screws holding my heater on flat because they weren't smart enough to use an impact driver to remove them. I needed to move the heater to adjust the drive chain that was slapping around in the case because they forgot to tighten it. Their labour cost was also almost 3 times what they had originally told me. I'll never go back there. They had a very inexperienced mechanic that I don't think even had his ticket yet. The parts manager is an idiot too. Didn't know how to look up the right parts book for my serial number. After waiting 3 or 4 days for a temperature sensor, it had the wrong wire connection. Took it back and a younger guy looked it up by my serial number. Here it is and we have it in stock and it's half the price of the other one. Incompetence at it's best.
Well, I finally got to sorting this machine out. I was wrong about what line had blown. I pulled seat, foot rest panel, and both belly pans to clean this mess out.
More of the mess
This hose is leaking underneath this mess: I got it all cleaned out and found the leak. Machine is going to stay down until the 8th as I'm on vacation for the week. Once it is operable, it'll go back to wash area to clean out the belly of the machine better before putting pans back on. I scraped five 5 gallon buckets of oily, grimy slop out of the belly of this machine, not counting what was stuck to the belly pans when they were pulled. Worst part was the straw. It wove together into a mat around hoses, bolts, etc that fought every move to remove the mess.
Damn I though our machines had disgusting belly pans! I can handle the oily gunk it would be the straw that messes with my allergies.
Yeah, that's a mess that took a while to accumulate. I'd think it would be a big fire hazard too. It would be nice if machines had slide out belly pans to make cleaning easy.
This one wasn't that bad to remove. Set a jack under the middle, then four bolts to remove, lower jack, roll out pan. The worst part was the 4" thick layer of old, dry manure adhered to the underside of the machine that had to be powerwashed and scraped off just to find the bolt heads. So, an hour of power washing/scraping and then 15 minutes to actually drop the pan. Only one of our skid steers doesn't have that manure build up stuck to the underside.
Another day, another dead 1845c. Same one that started this thread. It must like being carried around as it's the second time this year its puked all the hydro fluid out for a ride to the shop
One of the left side drive motor hoses blew where it passes underneath the right side drive motor. Pulled both hoses, second hose was in bad shape too.
I can only imagine how ripe it must have been to operate that machine when it was warm out and the machine up to temperature. When I got my 1840, there was a lot of oil soaked debris. I know the oil had just been changed with the access covers having not been removed. I think they just let it rip in the pan. The pan is not removable, just the 4 round corner covers. It was a bitch to clean but I eventually got it. I recently had to change the fan support bearing and noticed it was getting crap in it again. All leaves from this fall. I think screens on the sides of the engine compartment would help
Eh, I've been around the dairy cows longer than I can remember. The general smell of manure isn't as foul and off putting to me anymore as it is to my wife. Dry, crumbling manure just has an earthy smell, but the lagoon is a different story. I dropped the belly pans on this machine in June, so there was only one 5 gallon bucket worth of crap to scrape out compared to last time. I didn't drop the pans, I just opened the access ports and used a putty knife to scrape everything out through the small hole. It works. Most of the mess was oil that couldn't drain out because the drain spots were plugged.
"It's slow to start, better take it out of the barn and check the battery." Meanwhile, the hydraulic fluid is below the level of the sight glass and the belly pans are flooded again.
Crap!
My machine blew one of those lines, so I replaced all of them while I was in there. It's amazing how fast it empties the Hyd. tank when one of the hoses blows and the mess it makes.
Somewhere out there are 2 or 3 1845C with travel hoses run high instead of under, but, I believe that I used different length hoses.
As I was scraping all of the sludge out from around the hoses, I was pondering doing just that. We bed stalls with sand, so a lot of sand gets tracked in with the manure and ends up in the belly pans. I scraped about a ¼" thick layer of sand sludge off the bottom after I got the excess oil out.
Just as well buy a hyd. crimper and a full assortment of ends and hose. That way you can just do all of the hoses and you will be ready for the next 6,000 hours. Not much else out there that will be as simple to work on.