As per my recent post, the RH side drive motor went on my 322. The other side isn't looking that great either. With only 1300 or so hours, it's pretty disappointing to say the least. With 18-20K in repairs, the machine is pretty much a boat anchor. Wondering if anyone has encountered the same drive motor issue as I have? Is this a fairly common problem with this model of machine or a freak accident. Main reason I'm asking is should I try and find the same machine and have replacement parts for a really long time recovering portion of the loss in the long run, or stay away from the machine all together. How many reasonably trouble free hours do you have on your CT? Thanks
I think this has been talked about before ,so try a search.I have a 332CTL with 3500 hours and just starting to get metal in the final gear case.So i'm looking at hopfully changing out bearings and gear keep running it.I bought my machine new and have been changing the gear case oil every 500 hours,so i'm sure that has helped.Good luck Here is a place to check out http://www.loaderpartssource.com/ Discussion link
The drives do go bad pretty quickly even with proper maintenance and care. Where is the 18 to 20 k figure come from ? Drives are expensive but certainly dont cost that amount....
i did both side on my 329D at 2000 hrs and jd or hitachi replaced both side and to what i uderstand they where not quite right in the housing. When they replaced them l got two new drive motors as well. what i found was change your final drive oil every 250 hrs helps and i do sos or probe sample at the same time.
Hey pafarmer. Here are the numbers...... from a us dealer I can get a drive for $3500 plus 20% exchange rate and shipping. So $4500. My dealer here wants 6K for the exact same part. Go figure. My mechanic took the other drive apart as well and it has some funny wear marks on the back where there should not be any. He thinks the other drive isn't too far behind. So 9K for 2 drives. The pump that controls the boom functions is toast as well, and another one needs a partial re build. Plus all the misc. things incl. filters/oil to flush out the system. Figure about 4-5K in labour to get her up and running with flushing all the lines etc. Parts about 13K and labour about 5. Once she's back together, it'll be a matter of what will be next. If the machine had 3-4K hours on it I'd say oh well. With only 1350hrs. it's a shame. So I'm kinda stuck. It's tempting to get another of the same and have a parts machine but if this is a common issue with the JD CTL's not sure I want to be stuck with 2 parts machines..... Just don't know what to do......
It's not just an issue with Deere it is and issue with all brand skids.If you read the link i posted then others are mention also.I agree at those hours it isn't good.It goes back to if maintance and operation of your machine.The harder you run it the more issue you will have,no matter what brand. The 250 hour oil change would be what i would do and use synecthic oil helps.
Agreed, The same drives are used across multiple brands....was speaking in generalities...1350 hours isn't many to have Such major drive failure. We replaced a few on one 333D at approx. 3000 with superb maintenance. Changed at 50 hours and then every 250 and still failed. Poor design, bad drives, hard to say really. Only known fact for me is they fail prematurely no matter how well they are cared for....
I have a ct332 with 3500 hrs on it and my machine has been used and abused. But less than 100 hours ago I had lost power on my right track motor so I sent in both for rebuilding. The rebuild company asked for the power pack also since the drive motors aren't to bad the just needed seals and bearings and a couple of gears in the final. So sent tin the whole power pack they said it was a mess and rebuilt every thing. They give me a 1 year 1000 hr warranty on the rebuild. It cost me 9800 for shipping and rebuilding both track motors and the entire power pack. It took me about a week in shop time and about a week waiting for the parts to get rebuilt.
So what I'm hearing is such major failure is not common at those hours. It's not necessarily a reason to shy away from the CT line. Everything else being equal, with proper maintenance/operating habits it's not unrealistic to get 2,500-3K hours before these types of issues show up..... Thanks to all that have helped shed a little light on this thing.
Most of the larger tracked loaders around here doesn't matter the brand are rebuilt about 3000 hrs. And the wheeled are about twice that. The ctl's I think are less hours since they see a lot more abuse than a wheeled.
I also replaced both drive motors on my Bobcat at 2000 hrs - was painful at $7500. Bottom line is these CTL are just outright expensive to keep running.
There is no doubt they are expensive to run. I have always been of the opinion that anything your doing with a CTL that can be done as well or close to as well with a rubber tired machine, is costing you money (perhaps more than we even realize). I try to ensure that each hour on the CTL is one in which the machine is in its element. Doesn't always work out that way but that effort is always made.
Amen........ Where I live it's quite wet, quite often, so when the wheel guys are sitting at home I'm still working...... That's about the only way I can justify a CTL. Also, in my opinion I'm yet to see a final grade with a wheel machine to be as good as it gets with a CTL in the same/close amount of time........
Same here. A wheeled machine wouldn't even make it in to the ground we cover on a daily basis....They are worthless in my neck of the woods !
We have a ct332 with 5000 hours. Never touched the pumps ( knocking on wood) but have replaced the drives on both sides twice. Twice it was a failure in the gears that just wrecked everything and twice had the hydrolic side fail. Just keep in mind that we are not easy on this machine. Pushing tri axel loads of nasty topsoil around houses and using every bit of horse power that machine has got. We don't even want to talk about the work load it takes on once the ground freezes.
i had a cat 287b that i had to replace both drive motors and drive motor pump so i dont think it just the deere ... After doing that at about 3500 arm I traded it in because ineeded 12k in more repairs.Happy I traded it in. I was at about 8500 forparts becasue i did the labor myself
Every OEM struggles with this issue because the drive motors which are available simply are not as rugged as they need to be. I could deal with that if the repair/replace costs were not so high. Make a rebuild kit that allows the owner to rebuild his drives for $3k or so instead forcing complete replacement which seems to be the tactic used by most of these drive motor OEM's.
I bought a used CT 322 and had it 6 hrs and the hydraulic pump blew up sending fine particles through my whole hydraulic system ended up replacing pump, final drives hoses and flushing the whole system multiple times, have had nothing but troubles with it sence, worst 25,000 I have ever spent
I'm sorry about your "loss". It's painful. I know first hand.
I see this is a pretty old post. How has the machine held up for you since your concerns if you still have it
Since the repairs have been done I have had a lot of problems with the machine,it seems like everytime I want to use it something about the hydraulics doesn't work. I had John deere come pick it up on Monday for the latest issues and am hoping it will be a warranty issue on the hydraulic pump,if not I'm not sure I'm willing to stick anymore money into it I am up to around 30,000 in repairs now in the last year and was only able to put around a 100 hrs on it. I could have bought a whole different machine for what i have in repair costs.
Finally got my JD 322 back from the shop today,they checked electrical systems and system passed,checked hydraulic system and found hydraulic filter housing and parking brake solenoid on top of housing to be bad,they say when the main hydraulic pump imploded and sent metal through the system it caused grooves inside of housing causing solenoid to stick and not unlock the E-brake. I hope if anyone else has this kind of problem my post will help
While I know nothing about Deere, it reflects the risk that is taken when buying a higher houred track machines. Spending 30K on repairs on a CTL that is that old and not worth 30K on a good day, is an example of how easy it is to go down that rabbit hole. A CTL of any color is expensive to work on and when things keep going wrong your compelled to fix it. You cant resell it broke, and cant justify to keep fixing it either. This is my thought on the matter and how I address it. I buy new or near new or at least considered new by the OEM (warranty coverage). My current 2017 CASE TR340 had 300 hours on it when I bought it, I traded in a TR320. I paid 50K for it and it had the 3 year bumper to bumper warranty. I am currently negotiating numbers to trade it for a TV450. It still has the remainder of the warranty left, about a year. So far it will have cost me 10K to own the machine for about 2.35 years in depreciation, maybe less by the time we get done. It has been under warranty and other than shearing the bolt that holds the upper tilt cylinder on, I have not had an issue with the 1000 hours I have put on it. The bolt was covered. But the coverage is there if I do really need it. I get out while the resale is high and some factory warranty coverage still gives the next guy piece of mind (having factory warranty coverage is not always the case, but works well when it is). I have never kept a track machine longer than 2000K hours. The initial buy in can hurt depending on how much your will to spend on a CTL. However once your in, and you maximize the offers OEM's give through out the year, and trade it back while values are high, your only covering deprecation, and not huge repair bills. Some OEMs base warranty coverage is not as good, but extended coverage can always be purchased at time of buying the machine. WN has excellent base warranty coverage, maybe something to look into.
I stopped at a few different dealers over the weekend trying to get an idea of what the machine is worth on trade in,they say the track models hold there value and disappear as soon as they take them in. I know Im fighting a losing battle and I'm not going to get what I have in the machine but I have to stop the bleeding so to speak. The issue i have is that I can't justify buying a new machine for the amount of time I use it and there is no money being made with this machine to soften the blow of that big price tag of a new or fairly new machine. I have another wheeled skidsteer that I use for my business and the money that machine is making is going rite back into repair Bill's on this tracked machine so I'm losing all around on this one. I think I'm just going to have to suck it up and spend the money to get this machine behind me and hope I pick a better dealer than I did on this one. Thanks for your thoughts!!