Hi, everyone new to this forum. Just bought a 03 John Deere 644J high lift with around 30k hours to load our dump trucks ( light use) . It was a county owned machine on 250 hours maintenance schedule. Pretty well taken care and clean machine .my question is 30k hours a lot or they run pass that easily? How dependable this machine is and any issues of this model?If anything need to updated or any advice to keep it going. Thanks in advance.
Welcome to HEF JDGuy ! If they got 30,000 before you bought it it must have been fairly reliable. We have a bunch on mushroom farms here with JD loaders that consistently see 20-30,000 hours without issues. Yet the contractor owned machines are lucky to see 10,000 without issues. It is a crap shoot with 30,000. Usually at this point a relife is in order to extend the life of the machine. You could see anything from hose leaks, brakes, axle bearings, trans issues as well as liner issues on the engine with those kind of hours. Just keep those services up and run her until something pops up then address it if it is just going to be used lightly.
Thanks mg2361. I really count on your advice.
I see lots of machines with forks go high hours like that but I think picking stuff up is less stress than digging and driving into piles. The county here had a couple old D8H's with cable scrapers that still ran good. Proper maintenance and careful operators goes a long way.
Thanks, welder Dave I appreciate the info.