Hi, I have a 225D Cat excavator and it has 80w90 in the final drives. Is that an acceptable oil or should I install something else? Thank you!
That is the correct oil.
Sorry, it's not. The EP additives in gear oils will attack the "rubber" rings in the Duo-Cone seals and eventually cause the seals to leak. The correct oil for the final drives is a TO-4 SAE 30 which will work for ambient temperatures in the range of -20 to +25 DegC. Don't get confused with the apparent difference in viscosity. An SAE30 TO-4 oil is actually the same viscosity as an 80/90 EP gear oil.
So is the SAE30 TO-4 just 30wt engine oil with the TO-4 spec on the label. What is the difference between TO-2 and TO-4
my Cat 330l calls for 50wt.
No it isn't. It's a specific power train oil designed to work with both planetary transmissions and final drives/swing drives. TO-4 is the latest version of the specification. TO-2 was around like 15 years ago. Any machine manual for an older machine that recommends TO-2 oil should now use TO-4. So does the manual for the 225D, but not in Canada where the OP is based. For his ambient temperature range the correct oil is a TO-4 SAE30. An SAE50 oil would be for an ambient temp range something like 0 to 50 degC.
Nige, you are correct. I was going by the "smell" of the oil we drained from the final drives of the 215B we bought at auction. But seeing we have a duo cone seal leek, we will be using 30wt. I know that the GL5 additives are hard on Bolens garden tractor bronze gear as well.
If you already have a Duo-Cone seal leak you can bet that changing the oil from EP to a TO-4 won't cure it, the damage to the rings of the seal will most likely already be done. It's still worth a try though. However you may be lucky and find that simply replacing the O-rings (more correctly called Toric rings) will fix the leak without having to replace the complete seal which tends to get a bit spendy.
Thanks for the info! I found some Ultralube TO-4 30 oil in 20 litre pails. I will get it installed first of the week. The 80w90 was in it for about a month so I don't think there will be any harm done. Looks like Greg got some benefit from this post as well!
As an aside we have switched a number of compartments (swing drives, final drives, pump drives) in our Hitachi excavators from the manufacturer-recommended EP oil to a TO-4 spec. The improvement in oil condition as shown by oil analysis since that change has been nothing short of amazing. Hitachi wouldn't authorize us to replace their specified EP oils with TO-4 during from first fill when the machine were assembled because, according to them, "we haven't field-tested these oils so we can't approve their use" ............ what a load of ****. At the end of the machine warranty we told them what we were going to do & switched from EP to TO-4. We haven't looked back since.
What are the toric rings made of? Nitrile or silicone?