Seeking advice from anyone experienced with Insley Excavators. There’s one for sale a little more than an hour away from me that I’m going to go look at. Story is it ran 4-5 years ago before the owner died and it’s sat ever since. The seller said all they remember is the owner saying that there was some issue with the body rotation. He’s pretty sure he had to use the tracks to turn the body. I am only interested in the machine if I can get the engine started and moving under its own power. My question to those more experienced is, what things should I look for or check that are deal breakers? Any thing in particular to check about the body rotation issue? It’s an old piece of equipment and will likely need much work/maintenance. I don’t want the machine to make money with, just use around the property for projects. I don’t have experience with excavators but have worked on old cable dozers and old tractors/backhoes. Any advice or information is greatly appreciated.
IF and only if, you are lucky, maybe there's a house lock or swing brake engaged that they didn't know about and that's why she won't swing.
I agree there’s gonna to be a large amount of luck if I end up getting the thing running and decide it’s worth bringing home. If the brake is failing to release, is there any method to manual release it or bypass it to see if that’s the issue?
see how much play there is in the slewing ring. swing issue may be from fried swing box motor. or might just be relief valve settings. i'd get a flowmeter and pressure gauge out there and check each circuit. my guess is they ran a commercial shearing pump. yours sounds like a swing circuit issue if everything else works.
Thanks for the tip about gauge and pressures. After doing some more research it appears that the machine has 3 hydraulic pumps. The pump that runs the swing also runs the left track movement. So if the thing will run the left track and not swing then it must be something down line from the pump. All this hydraulic stuff is new to me. I’m planning to go look at it on Monday. Hopefully I can get that Detroit diesel to run and then can try to trouble shoot the hydraulics from there.
You may already know this, but make sure the rack is free before you start it so it doesn't run away.
I haven’t worked in Detroit diesels before but when doing some research, that’s a common thing people recommend. Thanks for the heads up JaredV.