I just bought a case 480c. I have gotten the major bugs worked out, but little ones are cropping up as I am trying to use it. Have bought seal kits and re-sealed two different cylinders already. The seals I replaced were dark and crumbly, so I expect to have to replace more. That's not my problem; I have never used a backhoe before, so I am trying to learn myself. I have been asking around and have learned some tricks. So far; 1. The tractor will tend to slide around if you take too much of a bite. I quit trying to take such a large bite out of the ground, and a guy told me to take the front bucket and turn it down and force it into the ground to raise the front of the tractor up. And then raise the back of the tractor off the ground with the stabilizers. That really did help it not want to move so much. 2. Trying to maneuver around. Someone told me if I get in a tight spot and need to make an adjustment, I can raise the front bucket, raise the stabilizers a little bit, and then put the hoe into the ground and force the tractor to slide over. The only way I can get this to sort of work is to put the hoe to the direction I want to move, force it into the ground, and then use the foot pedals to swing the hoe the opposite way to shift the tractor to the side. Any other tricks to do this? 3. Digging. I have a bucket lever, and dipper lever and a boom lever. I am trying to figure out how to judge where to put the tractor in relation to where I want to dig. Should I put it far away and stretch the boom out as far as it will go to start a trench? I have been using the dipper to put the bucket where I want to dig. And then I will just use the boom and the bucket to dig down. I will then move the dipper lever so it moves closer to the tractor, and then just use the bucket and the boom again to dig some more. I will drop it down with the boom, curl the bucket, lift the boom, and then use the foot pedals to swing to the side. How do you guys do it? I find if I stick the bucket in the hole I have made, and then try to move the dipper and curl the bucket, it then tries to move the tractor a little too much.
just gotta remember you dont have an excavator. backhoes will always move over time you will get used to it
Just try different things until you find what works for you; that's what all the rest of us did. It's not exactly rocket science digging holes with a hoe.
Check out a bunch of videos on youtube
I had a JD 410 with smooth pads on the stabilizers, it was awful! Weld aggressive 2" long cuts of heavy I beam to the bottom of your stabilizer pads to get some grip on the ground. Your dipper is the strongest component. Place the tractor so the boom, and dipper form a 100 degree angle. Dig until it's 70degree, then move the tractor. Dig top down, taking shallow passes enough to fill the bucket. Work down. Use teeth like the ones in your mouth. Their purpose is to stab into soil. Teeth perpendicular to dipper. I use spoil pans. I cut 275 gallon oil tanks in half. I weld short pieces of chain to the four corners, and the bottom. Using a short chain hanging from the bucket with a big ring, I pass two short grab chains through the ring. The four hooks hook to the four short chains on the "pan". I feel a ditch is much easier to refill using these pans to place the spoils in, then swing to the edge, unhook two hooks and dump back in. Repairing lawn three feet wide is much easier than repairing a twelve foot wide mess. Usually, a big rock, piece of concrete, or bucket of material in the front bucket will help to stabilize the machine while digging. Willie
First of all its going to take practice. Watching videos on youtube is great advice as well. Also, don't think of each individal lever operating a function, to get good, you really want to use two and sometimes three levers at a time. Don't worry it takes time. Just remember, slow is smooth, smooth is fast. If the machine is bouncing or if the hoe is bouncing you are not being smooth enough, slow down. You also want to peel layers off, you can't just force the bucket straight down into the ground. The comment about keeping the teeth perpendicular to the dipper will help alot. 1. Good advice, the tires are bouncy the bucket and outriggers are not. Keep them planted and mostly level the machine up. 2. You are never stuck with a backhoe until nothing will move. Just think of the hoe as an arm and how it would move the rest of the machine. I never turn around and drive the machine when I am trenching. Just pick the bucket and outriggers up and push yourself to where you want to go. If you need to, you can either steer with the front tires while you are pushing( this is pretty difficult till you practice) or you can pick the rear tires up and adjust things that way.
Thanks for the replies. I have seen people use backhoes for years and it looked easy. But it's not. When a guy is scraping the bucket along level with the ground, there is a lot more going on there than I realized. I had one guy tell me to grab the dipper and the boom levers with one hand, and then pull and twist your hand to smoothly move parallel with the ground. I see I might have remnants of some rubber pads on the stabilizers. Welding or bolting metal to the bottom may be a solution I could look into to help keep it from sliding also. I have to be careful now that I have this thing. I have already had two different neighbors asking me about doing some work for them. I told them I don't know what I am doing, but the one neighbor's septic was backed up last Sunday and he pretty much begged me to come over and help find the lid to the tank. We found it, and I didn't break anything, which is a miracle.
It just takes time in the seat on your machine to get proficient at it. Stay on firm, level ground until you can operate the machine. Now that winter is coming, resist the urge to "help" neighbors out. Ground conditions are turning to wet and sloppy, the last thing you want is your backhoe to become someone's yard art. BTW - The only machine I have ever rolled over is my 420DIT... (knocks on wood)
When I first started with my backhoe, it was an old open center machine, so to move two items you had to balance the levers. I spent an hour in the driveway working on the fine control, turning a soda can upright and tipping it over, worked that in between doing stuff and after a few sessions, fine control improved a lot. Yep practice, see what works for your specific machine, you can shift a little using the swing or crowd to push forward/back, keep your front wheels aimed the right way. bucket and outriggers down every time. If you're moving on a downhill grade, keep the teeth firmly in the trench to keep it from rolling away on you.
A case is no John Deere. I had a '74 JD410, It was an antique, but much smoother to operate than the 580 Case. I was unable to easily adapt to the case three lever, foot swing operation. I kept banging a building when swinging simultaneous to almost any other function.
I got the 480c service manual and parts book from the minnpar site, but they do not have a operators manual. They do have the operators manual on the 580c and that looks very much like my backhoe so I downloaded it. I discovered in the manual what the drive/neutral switch is for. I will have to go try it out. No wonder the brakes were having a hard time holding the machine back. Apparently it has some sort of electric clutch in it, I have the powershift on my unit. It says if I put it in neutral position, it will go into neutral when I hit the all in one brake pedal.
A Case is no John Deere and a John Deere is no Case. I think you're just used to JD controls and not Case controls. There's way too many Case machines sold to blame the controls. Worn out sloppy controls can come on any brand of machine. Using at least 2 controls at a time helps with smoothness and in tough digging don't extend the stick way out as it puts the most stress on everything. In hard digging keep the stick closer to the machine. The bucket has the most digging power. Sometimes you have to take little bites until you get into looser material. It takes practice to run a backhoe and don't expect to have it mastered in a couple hours.
For me to buy a new backhoe would involve a lot of hitchhiking, peanut butter and cornflake sandwiches, and dark cold evenings. Most of my playthings are used. The JD410 was pretty gently used. Paint was weathered but clean, both buckets were flawless, tires good 2000 hours. It worked great for the first 15 minutes. Then it got weak! Ultimately, it could dig, but only loose sand. Lifting a full front bucket took 120 seconds to full height! Eventually I traced the problem to a bad backhoe valve. Chain up the hoe, unhook the hydraulic lines, it was a fine loader. New Hampshire Hydraulics found the bores in the valve were too large for the spools. Three section bodies needed to be replaced. The part numbers had been superseded, the whole valve would be needed. A John Deere valve was more expensive than buying another machine. I like the design of the old JD hydraulics, but very few heavy equipment mechanics understand it. NorTrax was less than helpful! New Hampshire Hydraulics felt they could sell me an aftermarket valve, but they couldn't seem to find the time to order it. I called way too many times! 7 months later they sold me a $1500 valve that didn't fit. All the joystick mechanism had to be rebuilt to make it fit the narrower valve. Meanwhile, I got impatient, and bought a Case. It was equipped with extend a hoe, and John Deere controls. Although it was 14 years newer, they were hard years. After thousands in pins, and bushings in the hoe, I came upon a better looking twin. It was low hours, well cared for, but had no extend a hoe, and had Case controls. I couldn't get used to the controls, or more accurately hated getting used to the controls. Closed center hydraulics in a John Deere are effortless to mix functions. Open center hydraulics when you fully open the first valve in a bank, you stop flow to all the other valves. Downstream valves wait for flow. When the first is finished its cycle, and you release the valve, the next takes off like a bullet. With foot swing, the most erratic is swing. Maybe it's me, but I can much better control the backhoe with JD controls. I swapped hoes. I have the original extend a hoe, and JD controls on the better tractor. I built a Thumb. I sold the other. I did fix the JD. After working the bugs out, the buyer got a very nice old tractor. I loved that hoe. The loader not so much. The Case has more lift, maneuverability, and operator ease with torque converter.
#2 son learned in a slightly different way in the driveway. My father died leaving an inexpensive safe with no one knowing the combination. There was something in it, but no way to know how important it might have been. I spoke to a locksmith who told me it isn't worth preserving it. If you can cut it open, do so. I wasn't up for using a cutting torch or abrasive saw. I figured it'd destroy papers inside. One evening I heard a commotion, I looked out to see ten year old Zachary in the hoe. He had a 5000 LB boulder. He'd lift it, and drop it on the safe. It took several rounds of smashing it before it opened. It contained manuals for clutter such as lawn mowers long since disposed of. Oh well! Willie
Practice makes perfect what I learned how to do with the backhoe is don't dig but take your bucket and try and hold the bucket a certain height off the ground and pull it to you while trying to maintain that height. It will help you get used to doing multiple functions at once and slow and smooth is fast
I will try that. I just bought the house I live in about a year ago, it's at the bottom of a mountain. It gets a lot of water in the dug out basement, it was built in 1923. I want to dig a trench in a big arch around the back of the house, and make a french drain to try and stop the water. I figured I could buy something and do it myself, and then sell the piece of equipment and come out ok. I was thinking about buying one of those harbor freight trench diggers but glad I didn't. I have been practicing trying to dig a large stump out of the ground as my first project, but it's not going to well. Talking to people I am finding out you have to dig a really hug hole to successfully dig a large oak out of the ground. Along the way I have dug up some huge rocks out of the ground, so large that they won't fit in the front loader bucket. I can see that harbor freight thing trying to move one of those rocks. I am glad I bought the Case, they seem to hold their value well. I am just afraid something major is going to break and then it's going to cost too much to fix. $30 a piece for cylinder seal kits is not bad, and that's been the worst thing so far. It didn't have any brakes when I got it, but a 25 cent o-ring in each wheel cylinder fixed that right up.
For a very large stump don't try and dig it out close to the stump dig deep ( maybe 4 or 5')10 or 12 ' away to break off all the roots where there not to big then you can undermine it and give a tug on some of the bigger roots. It will soon start to move & twist out much easier than pull out. This isn't the greatest explanation but will give you a start. When digging your trench to help smoother operation just run the machine 12 to 1500 rpm and don't try and take to big of bites. After a few 100 hrs. of practice you'll be far more competent.
i have videos on youtube of me running my 580c I aint a pro but I get it done. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bePoP01Fn3w
What he said. I like to size up the tree. Dig far enough from center that you can easily break the roots. A Pine needs the roots severed at 2' depth, a maple, more like four. I dig wide where I can reach, then move in to break the roots closer to the stump. Usually both sides of the stump. Move the tractor, and approach from a different angle. A much easier technique is to use the tree trunk as a lever. If you don't have enclosed ROPS, please don't do this; Approach the tree just the right distance. Reach up almost as high as you can. Set the teeth well in the bark of the tree, and extend the dipper. This adds a 16' lever to the power of your hoe. Trees up to 2' DBH go down with repeat application. Bigger may need digging first. I know, I'm compensating. I take great satisfaction in overpowering giant trees weighing 15 times what I weigh. Willie
I always try before digging lol i posted a youtube video of one i pulled
If you cannot run a case foot swing ,4 stick hoe you are not an operater . Seriously take your time and learn how to make 2"cuts about 6 /8 feet long and level .Practice in the yard with no digging involved over barrels , bucket , , . Learn how to synch those levers . trying to help
now this is stupid I dont wanna start an argument Just because you cannot run a 4 stick does not mean that your not an operator. Its just not easy compared to a joystick setup or a wobble stick. Its all personal preference. Wanna know whos not an operator a keyboard warrior that never ran a machine before thats not an operator
Good advice there. Practice.
Try a John Deer anywhere from 1970 to the present, then compare it to a case from the 70s or 80s. JD used closed center. All 6 or 7 sections receive equal pressure. You can operate them all at once if you want. Case open center prioritizes the first section. Open the first section, there isn't much left down valve. End use of that section, suddenly others come to life. Most disconcerting to have swing take off like a bullet. Very good operators can control a Case to equal the best JD operator. I learned on JD controls, specifically excavators. Changing to Case controls was not impossible. I chose a more familiar system. Willie
I am definitely not an operator. Besides getting the feel for the levers which I haven't mastered yet, I thought there may be some tricks, short cuts and methods people have learned. For example my ditch/french drain project. I don't have a transit, so I will have to carefully figure on the slope of the ditch. I am thinking I had better get it right the first time since it may be very difficult to back the hoe back over and straddle the ditch and do any depth adjustments. Is that true? Is it pretty much impossible to re-dig a long ditch or could I carefully back over the ditch and dig a little more? Would there be any purpose in starting in the middle and digging one way, and then go back to the middle of the ditch and dig it the other way and split the job in two? And then I have to figure on where to put the dirt so I can still get in there with the front loaded and dump the gravel in the ditch. P.S. I just had a thought; Maybe I can make minor adjustments with the gravel?
Get a 10 or 12' 2x4 & a level start at one end jump in the ditch and check your slope every 10' that way you can adjust before you move the machine. Go approx. 10 or 12' each move you'll be able to judge by the marks left with the stabilizers. Just put the dirt far enough from the edge it won't fall back in you can drive the front wheels up on the pile to put the gravel in and each time you approach the ditch just put one front wheel in the previous wheel mark and the loader will be lined up perfect. Other than practice to learn something asked the question as each situation arises then some one with experience can coach you on how they approach that given situation.
I would dig from the top down. Put spoils as far to one side as you can. Move them away from the ditch with the loader. If you know ditch length, and fall height, you can calculate pitch. A 20' length of 1/16 x2" square tube aluminum with a spirit level gives you a good notion of grade. I have an old spirit level with 1/4" per foot welded to one. A four foot level needs a 1" square tube spacer under one end. If water is present, you can use water to maintain grade. High spots get removed, if puddle is too deep fill. Maintain a thin layer of water in the bottom of the ditch. Avoid the bottom of the ditch getting too wide or too narrow. Too narrow, you're asking for erosion in fast run off, too wide, gunk will build up. I'd use your bucket to get a uniform width. Stone needs to cover the bottom, and several inches up the sides, grass above that. Willie
Sounds like a plan. Thanks for the tips.
After thinking about your plan I'm not so sure a ditch full of rock will solve much for long . The simplest and easiest way to deal with the water would be a (swale)( swail) ? around the house sloping out one end to carry the water away. If it's under ground water then your ditch should have Big-0 or 4"perforated PVC in it with the drain rock covered with landscape fabric.
One helpful tip for digging is a zip tie tied to a hydraulic line, extending out the side of the machine like a flag, as long as your bucket is curled the same way, it'll help you be consistent. For bottom trench work, my usual was to have a short level and a good 8' 2x4. dig 10 feet of trench and then go look at the bottom. Minor issues in 8' can be fixed with a shovel, major issues are still within reach of the hoe. Preserve your measuring pad on the end toward the machine, you can use that as a benchmark for the next 8'. it wont' take too long to get a feel for it.
I thought about making some marks on the side of the hoe at the 2, 3 , 4, etc. foot depths to help me figure how deep I am going. I was planning my ditch to be about 5 to 6 ft away from the house. If I get near the house I have been told I need to stay at least 2ft away, it has stepped footers and I will need the ditch to be somewhat deeper than the footer of the house. It's a stone house and was built in 1923. Someone hand dug the basement out, but they stayed 2ft away from the inside walls, so I have a 2ft "shelf" all the way around the inside of the basement. I was going to make a large "U" around the whole back and sides of the house, and I was going to lay fabric in the ditch and up the sides, put a little gravel in place on the fabric, lay corrugated pipe with the holes in it in the ditch, pour more gravel to cover the pipe, and then fold the fabric over the gravel. When I back filled I was going to leave it a little shy, and try and slop the top edges of the ditch inward to give me a swell. This should help during summer time deluges, the french drain should help with the slow seeping water. It can rain very hard, and my basement will be dry till about a day later when the water finally seeps under the house and through the basement walls. I am not trying to finish this basement for a living area, just trying to get rid of the water so I can keep up with any mold or dampness problems. Right now there is no way a dehumidifier can keep up with all that water seeping in.
Well, if its a stone foundation, its likely pretty solid overall. I think you're on the right track and I'm willing to bet, somewhere in your digging, you will find an underground source of water, some hidden natural drainage. I did one much the same, we found a 2' deep swale filled with clinkers and cinders that ran past the original house but then was broken by a small addition. It made a natural pipe into the basement.
Figure out where your water is coming from. If it's an underground ****** of water of limited flow, intercepting it before it gets to the house will work well. If your cellar is below water table periodically, you must be below the footing with your perforated curtain drain. If on a bit of a sidehill, you can dig lower than your footing, pitch it slightly downhill to daylight. Stone is expensive, but a very good investment. I suggest laying 12' wide landscape fabric on the bottom of the ditch, lay a bit of stone, then drain hose. Top it with as much stone as you can afford. Wrap the stone with the landscape fabric, and cover with soil. I'd stay as far from the footing as I could. 8 feet would be fine! I don't know your situation, but catch basins can transport run off rain to the drain without leaving it on the surface. It is critically important to filter this surface water to keep debris from plugging underground drains.
****** is a dirty word???
$tream is a dirty word???????
Sounds like you have it figured pretty good if possibly I would stay more than 2' from the foundation like Willie said. I don't know and never heard of landscape fabric on the bottom of the ditch or what purpose it would serve but not saying it would hurt.Fabric on top of the rock is important & best size of rock for this purpose is 3/4" to max.1.5". Putting very much rock under the pipe and the ground will stay wet if clay every soft spot Big 0 will sag.Using 4" PVC perf sewer pipe would be much more likely to stay on grade. If you decide to use it keep the writing on top holes will be at 4 & 8 0:clock. Measure your bucket from the bottom of the teeth to the top with the face vertical ( probably around 3') this will give you something to judge your dept by.
Water is often carrying in suspension lots of mud. If mud infiltrates the crushed stone, it fills the space between the rocks. All your work, and expense putting it there goes to waste. Unless you dig to clean ledge, you want to keep mud from getting into the stone from all directions. That's why I suggest wrapping your "tube" of stone, and drain tile in filter fabric. Might your problem be surface water sinking into the ground after rain? Does your house have a gutter system? Willie
Good point Willie they sell Big O already wrapped which is used here to dry up fields with water problems and I hadn't remember ed that. It's installed with a big cat with a ripper on the back that lays the pipe and installed directly into the ground with no stone for $ 1,000 and acre. 10 years ago I was hired by a company to do a repair in a farmers field & was amazed at how much water was flowing in the big 0. This was in a field of straight clay. That big 0 may be an option.
Willie, have you seen the new stoneless drain? its a 6" corrugated perf pipe wrapped in about a foot of styrofoam peanuts in a fine mesh drain sock. It really looks like something, I'm not sure how it'd ever work if just buried in clay rich soil. I put a drain in clay heavy soils, 2' wide trench, fabric, 8-10 inches of stone, pipe wrapped in sock, foot of stone and flattened it off. I made a trench box out of plywood and some 2x4 blocking on the ends, I'd put the mini trench box in, centered atop the fabric wrapped stone, backfill just enough to hold it, put a loop of fabric down inside and back up again, spring clamp to the sides of the box then slowly fill the box with stone, backfill the rest of the way then pull the box out of the hole, leaving a 4" wide, 4' tall, fabric wrapped channel to make like a mini wall, where I was only down 4-5' it carried the stone to daylight. I did have to block the ends to keep everything from slipping back but with a couple more scraps, I was able to move right along and solve the surface and underground water issues.
I looked at the styrofoam peanut pipe. Lowe's carries it, about $53 for a 10ft piece. Too expensive for me.
I like it. Willie
I pay about $66. for 5 cubic yards 13500 lbs of 1-3/4" stone. That works out to about 30 feet of ditch. Trucking cost with my truck is about $15. I leave home, go to the quarry, then to my land, dump and return. Somehow 1.5 hours are consumed. Cost of placing in the ditch is hard to calculate, you need fabric too. The peanut pipe sounds reasonable if it works well. It's hard for me to imagine it works as well as stone though. Willie