My excavator has often sat for long periods unused and not in a dry environment, result is a fair amount of rust in the undercarriage. I've never worried much about it and planned to one day take the track gear off, get all the h-frame sandblasted and painted but recently had noticed oil weeping from one of the track Motor casings. Took the covers off and was horrified at the amount of corrosion on the externals of the motors. The one without the leak is considerably worse and with a quick scratch of a screwdriver shed a decent layer of rust off. Was after some advice on how to treat, pull the motors out and clean up, or give them a blast with wire brush angle grinder and slap some paint on? For now I'll clean all the crap out and try and find where the leak is coming from. Thanks
Honestly, I've seen worse! My advice is to clean the housings out with a pressure washer, fix the leak, give them a good old soak with fluid film or similar and forget about them until the next problem occurs.
I'd second that, clean them out with a pressure washer, dig off all the loose rust, let it dry and optionally slap on a coat of rust converter followed with fluid film or other spray rust inhibitor.
and stop parking it in the ocean!
Has worked in lime in its previous life as I'm finding clumps of it all over. I sure hope I never have to change out this motor as the bolt heads are really bad, they will snap off for sure, and that's if I can even get a socket on them seeing how eroded they are. Thanks for the advice, I will treat as advised now and revisit when I give the whole machine a birthday in a couple of years.
Maybe a little dilute vinegar wash in the pressure washer but likely a good pressure wash will likely take care of it. When it comes time to remove those bolts, you might need to weld a new head on them and hope the threads are clean!
The crimped hose ends are often the weakest link when it comes to rust .