I've been struggling to take the clyinder head off the bucket ram (and boom ram) on a PC60-2 this evening. It seems to be completely stuck. As per the photo below there are notches for a tool to slip in to grip the head and turn it. I had no tool of course so I tried a heavy bolt + hammer on the notch and then I borrowed a big stilson wrench with a 6 foot bar for leverage, no joy. I've tried a bit of heat from a blowtorch and a few knocks of a hammer too. I haven't been too rough on it as the steel on the head is getting the imprint of the stilson and getting chipped from blows of the bolt. I looked for a grub screw or a pin or something that could be stopping it but see nothing, and there is nothing in the exploded diagram from the parts book (though it could have been done by someone in the many years since the factory). I'm wondering is there something specific with this ram that I need to do or is it a case of a little more torque and a little more heat? I've no idea what the notches are for on the housing, that part doesn't seem to move, but hardly there for show either!
The lock is the flat between the gland flange and the barrel, the metal will have been deformed after assembly into the notch on the barrel with a hammer and punch. Take a blunt chisel or a screwdriver you don't care about and flatten the metal at the bottom of the barrel notch out toward the gland. Might not make much difference, some of these are really stuck. A little heat, get somebody to lean on the long wrench and shock the barrel just behind the gland with a three to five pound hammer..... don't wail on it, just healthy whacks to try to get the threads moving. Be careful not to hit that welded fitting! Of course when you hit it the whole thing will vibrate and the wrench will fly off.
I take it it's the part highlighted in the following pic you are saying is the lock? I've shoved what was lying into the notch back towards the flange, it may help. I've tried to get some WD40 in between the barrell and this strip of metal that folds into the notch , there could be friction adding to the problem. I'll go at it again tomorrow when I've a helping hand to swing the hammer while I lean on the wrench.
Yessir....
Lantraxco is bang on.. Be sure not to clamp the barell in a vies close to the head as that will work against you.. Best to crack the glands on unit.. My .02
heat it with an oxy/acet torch. it will spin off really easy. not red hot, just enough to get it to let go. but way hotter than a blow torch. ive done hundreds of cylinders.
A stilson/pipe wrench is not up to the job. Make yourself a custom socket to fit all four of those notches, it can be a pipe that's big enough to slide on the outside of the sleeve at the end of the cylinder so it doesn't slip to one side, with four cogs of hard steel welded inside to fit those notches. Onto the outside of the pipe you add two pipes to use your 6' pipes in.
There is an old post on here, where they use a hammer to hammer around this area which helps loosen up gland nut. My be lightly hammer. Think ATCO posted this.
I usually resort to heat and an air Chisel on those Style heads
With thanks to Willie and OCR, here's the peening thread, it won't be as easy with that big sleeve on the end of the barrel, but it can't hurt.
I dropped the cylinders (boom and bucket) up to a local welder who does this sort of thing. Anyway we started with the bucket cylinder, nice bit of heat and it came off without too much drama. Then we went at the boom cylinder. It took a lot of heat and we moved it 1/8 turn and I thought we had it. Then we found it was stuck, 2 big fellas swinging off the 8 foot bar. We used more heat and got it maybe an inch or less and after an hour gave up having made very little progress. It seems rightly stuck. There was a welding job done on the cylinder behind the head, this may have been done badly and affected the head, maybe we're trying to pull a bit of weld through the threads, maybe not. Should have resolved to heating/cooling a few times before forcing it? Anyway, now I'm ringing around engineering shops seeing if a repair is worthwhile. The welder reckons that if I pick up a ram that takes the same size pins, of about the same length and diameter the replacement ram should work fine, we can weld on new pipes to suit etc. What do ye think? I said it to local excavator dealer and he reckoned no, but maybe he would say that Also any thoughts on getting the head off the cylinder at this stage?
I dunno how I missed this post, could have saved me a lot of trouble I'll give it a go though I might have damaged the threads by now.
Funny, I've never had any issues with a Japanese cylinder, I think due to metallurgy and the thread form. Deere cylinders back in the 80's on the other hand seemed to have too fine a thread and about half the time stripped everything on the way out of the barrel.
I'd try to tighten it and then work it back and forth in that range as long as it takes to loosen up, then back and forth a little at a time without forcing it enough to seize the threads. Weld up a cylinder that will fit over the fat part of the cylinder and hold in place with four tabs that fit the notches in the gland and with a plate to weld a pipe to, to make that hard work tolerable.
I tried the "peening" method described in the link above above and managed to get the cylinder head off, but the damage was done already. We ended up ripping the threads completely. I'll never know if I might have avoided trouble if I had tried this first ointhead My welder reckoned we could replace the seals and just weld the head back in but after speaking to a guy with an engineering shop he quoted to re-manufacture the glands and re-thread the cylinder head, so that's what I did. He cut the glands off the cylinder and I will weld on the new one (below). Because we used so much gas the old o-ring and back up ring were burnt to bits and now I don't know exactly where to put the new o-ring and back up ring on the cylinder head. In the picture above I have arrows to where I think they should go, does anyone know for sure?
I'd bet they go in the other groove on top of the other rubber. But I can't say for sure.
Nothing goes in that spot next to the threads your arrows point at, except maybe some anti-sieze. The O-ring goes in that groove nearest the outside that looks black on the bottom, you might want to take a brass brush and brake cleaner to it a bit more, scrub it out. O-ring goes toward the threads which is where the pressure comes from, white backup goes to the outside away from the threads and pressure. Look closely at the white ring, some of the backups have one side that's made with a depression for the o-ring to sit in slightly. Easiest way to put them on, start from the smaller threaded end, install the white ring first, a little light grease and your thumbs will usually get it done, if it's stubborn heat the white backup ring in some boiling water for a minute, pull it out with a seal pick or something, use gloves of course to stretch it on. Then the O-ring goes in. Just thought of that. Maybe it's just the picture but will that head screw all the way into that gland so the O-ring will go inside the bore? Doesn't lool like a big enough ID Not sure I was clear, hope it helps a bit. Cheers, Lanway
Thanks for that. The rings I had were too small, I tried fitting them till they broke and ended up going down to the seals place to get proper ones. As for the I.D. of the gland, it should be OK, I had it screwed in all the way already. I've left all the parts with my welder guy along with a new rod as the old one had damage to the chrome. Hopefully he'll get to it tomorrow.