so long story short i am replacing the old hydraulic fan motor and assembly. i will be installing an electric motor in its stead. i will be disconnecting the offload line part number- 148-8385 and putting a plug there. then i am disconnecting the inflow line for the hydraulic fan motor and linking it with the outflow. in the old fans place will be a 3000 rpm electric cooling fan with a temp sensor and a relay switch. so when it reaches a certain temp on the radiator it will turn on automatically. it will also turn off automatically. it will be a direct connect to the battery with an unplug option. i didn't see anything like this done before and i don't know why. so if this seems like a bad idea let me know now thanks. besides its $45 vrs the replacement fan motor from cat being $650. also the old fan is non optional the figure 8 seals on it are done for inside the motor. equipment # 5sz02611
Personally I thing I'd be find a hydraulic motor for it I dont have much trust in electric fans theres a reason most all equipment doesn't have electric fans. Also you may not have enough alternator to keep up.
the alternator gives out 55 amps and the fan requires and draws 15 amps. so i think it will be fine. the main concern is weather or not the fan will be able to keep going with dust and dirt.
Off the subject of the fan motor for a moment, are you planning on removing the radiator for a complete external cleaning where the oil leak from the fan motor has clogged the core to a great extent..? From the photos it appears as though the air flow through the core has been severely reduced. Just a thought. Have you tried a local hydraulic shop for the figure-8 motor seals..?
yes i have tried a local shop and he said that they cant find those seals and that the only option was another hydraulic fan motor or an electric one. so i decided on the electric on being cheaper and just as effective. as far as the radiator the main structure itself looks fine but i will be taking it to be pressure washed soon. i just got the plug in today for the radiator. it is plugging the hole that was used to offload excess hydraulic fluid from the fan motor. ill be cleaning the entire engine compartment with a pressure washer. and yes i will be making sure not to get too close to the radiator. im aware that the fins are fragile. also off topic thanks again nige for responding to another one of my posts. your insight is always welcome here. The one thing that i am worried about now is whether or not the additional pressure from the loop will have adverse effects due to there not being a hydraulic motor in the mix anymore. further more having that plug in the radiator will it effect that too.
Got the same issue, got new seal for GP motor then read these pumps have no re build kit. So why do they stock the shaft oil seal? If when you pull alart motor its likely that you'll damage internal gaskets. Makes no sense. Though about changing to electric fan also. Will try and fit new seal soon but guessing internal gaskets will probably break during tbis re fit. Guess l'll see
yeah man dont put that seal on it. it doesnt fix the problem. the best bet is to wait or do what i did and get an electric fan. im sending the parts to my friend to see if he can make the same seals from a similar grade of material using a laser printer and a compressed gasket sheet. so if you standby ill let you know how it turns out. but yeah i cant find those seals anywhere atm. your talking about the figure 8 seals right werty246?
Cool. Will do
Just out of curiosity what year model is your 246, mines a 2002 with a black perkins engine. I noticed yours has a yellow cat motor with Cat badge.Cat must have used CAT and perkins motors or swapped to perkins at some stage.
Yours is black because it's the original to the machine his is yellow because it is a cat reman
Because the shaft oil seal is usually the one that leaks. As I explained on Shawn's other thread the fan motor (in common with a lot of components on the early Cat skid steer product line) is designed to be throw-away. This was done for cost reasons to make the machines competitive price-wise with established brands when Cat first entered the market back 20+ years ago. People like yourself and Shawn are the ones who suffer because you now have a 20 year-old machine with components on it that are deemed non-repairable. (As a sidebar if the figure-8 seal is leaking there is a fair bet that the reason for that is internal wear in the pump causing excessive pressure on the seal, so even a new seal won't necesarily be a long-term fix for the leak. It might fix it for a while, but it is likely to return in short order.) Cat bought Perkins in 1997. The only difference between the two engines is the paint colour and the badge. As Tyler says Reman engines were generally alll badged as Cat. Manufacturing location may also have some bearing on the colour/brand of the engine in the early days just after the merger which is when both your machines were produced.
Most all the really early machines with 3034 engines have reman engine as there was trouble with them alot of them didnt make 100 hours I have a 246 I bought for the engine to install in the 277 I had it has wrote in the engine compartment "new engine at 79 hours"
as far as the seal leaking i believe that is because the seal is old itself. when seals are used and beyond 10+ years of service i believe that depending material used that the elasticity if said seal breaks down when exposed to certain fluids/heat over long periods of time. the figure 8 seals in question have to be removed gently because upon first inspection the seal broke apart with little pressure. now if the seals themselves were soft to the touch like say a brand new o ring and they are shredded i would believe that to be pressure/bad placement by user. but these seem to be very fragile and the motor nor the seals were never replaced. which would leave me to believe that it is the seals and not the motor itself. HOWEVER! there is a possibility that over time with multiple changes of hoses and changing of fluid that there has been (particle contamination) in the hydraulic fluid. and over time has worn down the insides. but yeah i have taken a look at a lot of components of the hydraulic motor and it seems like that is not the case. but like i said before im looking into cutting out my own seals or worst case getting new ones made via various services online. overall i will be looking at different materials to determine which is best for the motor. best case scenario is that it works amazing and people in need of the very same seals/gaskets can get them from me. i will continue to update this as i go. here are just a few that make seals. http://canadarubbergroup.com/gaskets-for-hydraulic-systems/ http://www.quickcutgasket.com/gasketing-materials.html
Thanks Shawn,Nige & Tyler, your info and experience is second to none. I was ripping my hair out trying to obtain info regarding hyd pump. 3034 oil pick up etc. You guys have set me straight. So much appreciated.
My 246 is a 2001 model. When I got it the fan motor seal was leaking oil all over the place. One of the thru bolts on the motor was missing. I bought a new seal and bolt at Cat for about 20 bucks and put it on, not being too optimistic. Two hour job including pressure wash. That was nearly 300 hours ago and no problems since.
yeah i have all of my thru bolts atm. if it were that simple i would be laughing atm. but yeah i bought the same top seal that rides the fan shaft and replaced it with no luck. same thing happened all over where oil was coming out of the shaft seal and going everywhere in the engine compartment. @Werty246 no problem mate. the main thing now is seeing if you can get an aftermarket fan motor that matches the specs of thae one on the 246. or buying a brand new one from cat. besides that like i said ill be trying to make the seals myself. either way i hope you are able to get the problem resolved.
I have a parts engine if you want some used spares there free to your taking
he has the same problem as me with the hydraulic fan motor and the figure 8 seals the red ones.
I'll give the seal a go. See how it goes, not expecting miracles from an 18 year old part but worth a try. Keen to see how the electric fan conversion goes with Shawn.Might end up going diwn that path too. Or fork out big$ for a new cat one. Seems a lot for a bloody cooling fan though. Cheers
also these are the seals i spoke of. the red figure 8 seals for anyone wondering.
Come to think of it if I remember right the fan motor is a sae style 2 bolt mount can a motor be sourced from a place like surplus center
update! so i have the fan it has finally arrived. it is too small for the shroud so im putting it dead center and im going to see how that works. just currently looking for a (key on wire)- ie when you turn on the machine the fan has power in the relay awaiting the temp switch to send signal back to relay to turn on the fan. thats all i need now. but we will see soon.
update! so the fan works well for short term use. i ran the fan for about an hour with variations of applied gas to the peddle. now the fan is directly attached to the radiator and i am running it direct from battery. no problems with the alternator keeping up with the recharge to the battery as of yet. i will however reattach the original shroud used on the radiator and attempt to attach the electric fan to it. now the reason for saying it is good for short term use. when running it like i said i ran it for an hour in the first 30 it seemed to be running nice cool air through the radiator then at the one hour mark it was full heat. probably around the 200 f area. hence why i only ran it for an hour and not longer. now when i shut the machine down i left the fan running for 5 minutes after 5 minutes it was blowing cool air down ward onto the motor. i will continue to update you all on the progress as it goes. update on seal. original seal has been received by the person making a new one. no update yet on how long it will take to make it nor what process they will take. i will also continue to bring updates on this for all those interested.
Thats great progress. Keen to do the same. Any tips on choice of fan and how to wire it to pick up engine temp.? Regards Werty246
Didn't the original blow air up and out?
Yes yes it does
so the fan in question is about 47usd in total. the fan itself has two options as far as push or pull. anyways its on amazon. the link is below. the one i put down in the link is 52$ but you can find them for cheaper on amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Performance-...r+fan+with+temp+sensor&qid=1589252248&sr=8-65 also here is the wiring diagram if you would like to take a look. http://www.catsch.info/renr4823.html to be honest there is a few different types of fans that can be bought online. and like i said it works as a temp fix but it isn't a good permanent fix for the problem. @Werty246
Cheers Shawn l'll check thelinks thanks mate
Well l fitted shaft seal on hydraulic radiator fan motor and used gasket maker to replace internal figure 8 gaskets. As predicted it failed after 1hr. So ordering electric thermo fan motor and save $500+ . The fans on amazon that Shawn used look ideal. Thanks heaps for the tips.
I think the jury is still out on whether or not those electric fans will actually do the job.
Those figure 8 seals look to seal the sides of a gear. The radial stubs likely to prevent rotation. Would O-rings seal ? Perhaps Teflon rings ? After my experience with an ORB fitting and Teflon tape. I have new respect for redneck hacks.
Update: so radiator is completely clean, fan is blowing upward and out through the radiator. and temp gun to see what temps reach in the radiator is on its way from amazon. for the time being i will be researching other improvements on the cat while i wait for that to get here. such as installing a drain line for high flow applications and weather or not the cat skid steer can operate the brush mower attachment we have. also starting two new threads soon on this skid steer and another. but in the mean time it isn't ruled out. (just on the fence atm) however if you can throw the cash at a new hydraulic fan motor id suggest that lol. this whole adventure on electric fans has raised some questions and generated a lot of theories! ill also submit new photos and how i cleaned the radiator on this cat without taking it off!
update: it ran 45 minutes small amounts of heat. checked periodically to make sure that the radiator wasn't plugged and it started heating up on the top right half and that spread to the middle top then the top left. Yahoo no plugs inside. so i let it run for a while while cooking steaks on the smoker and after 46 minutes or so into it i noticed a red light come on. its the low oil pressure light. so ill have to postpone any celebration and solve yet another damn problem. oh BTW the electric fan seems to work well ATM. i have the air going upward from inside the engine compartment and its working fine. here are some pictures of the setup. im sure ill put a switch in but i dint want to cut any of the wires on the cat to tie in that automatic temp sensor relay yet. so i took the fan and motor and took it off of the shroud it came with. then i reversed it and attached the plastic shroud to the inside of the metal one. the black wire is ground and the blue wire hooking up to the red wire is the power. oh and also put some of those foam stickers between the base of the electric fan motor and the metal shroud. mainly because when it gets up to speed it made a rattle noise ,when i discovered the source i put the foam inserts between the two and now its quiet. so all and all i cleaned the radiator fins with a garden hose and some dawn dish soap to get it unplugged that took days to do. but overall it is ready to go back to work i think. depending on this engine oil problem...... i just hope it just needs that 1/4th of oil filled and that's it. oh and @Werty246 there ya go mate! oh and side note a 18 inch fan would be perfect lol. oh and another thing that hose from engine to radiator on the right shakes like crazy. does that happen to anyone else?????
Cheers Shawn, ordered my fan today,The hose on my 246 doesnt shake just slightly vibrates with the engine running. Regards Werty
Hi from Australia I have the same problem with my 246c top seal leaking and no seal kit available new motor only available $900-$1200 So going electric Can I just plug the hydraulics or do you need to put the pressure into the return? Can i use the power to the solid for the fan ?
My set up looks different
Thats because the OP had a 1st Generation 246. You have a 3rd Generation 246C. It’s like comparing apples to oranges. Post your Serial Number and I’ll take a poke around for parts listings. There is a chance your fan motor was made by Rexroth, in which case you might be able to get a seal kit for it from a Rexroth dealer.
Thank you Nige I’m in Oz so maybe a problem getting it but we will see CAT0246CLJ03641
Pretty shore it’s 2582577
Sorry CAT 0246CLJAY03641 I missed the A
We do have that company Rexroth in Australia He did a check but couldn’t cross it to anything . Parts or replacement.
You need the last 8 characters for the S/N, so JAY03641. You're right. it's part of a Group 258-2579. Here's a breakdown of the Group, with the 278-8716 seal kit for the motor listed right at the bottom.
Great Thank you Nige I’ll see what I can do
The only word of warning I will sound is that if the shaft on the motor has any sort of groove that was caused by the old seal wearing into the shaft material then the possibility exists that a seal kit will not fix your problem. There are quite a few aftermarket suppliers that appear to be offrering that seal kit, in addition to Cat dealers obviously.
If I were looking to change to an electric I'd hit a couple of auto junk yards and see what might fit. I've never seen one of those aftermarket fans that put out nearly the air flow that factory fans do. My Silverado is electric and it's a hurricane, nothing like those cheap Chinee ones on Amazon. Joe H
Sounds good . Looks like I might have something but they need to confirm if the red seal is in the kit .shaft looks good. Another thing the fan looked to be moving slow . Just thinking do the solid have straight 12 volt it’s off and on or is it variable.
Hi guys got a repair seal kit from CAT all seals
Is the fan variable speed on a 246c Looks to be turning slow when cold .
Yes, it's a demand fan. For a test try disconnecting the solenoid - the fan should go to full speed.
Thanks Nige I’ll give it a go
Can hyd 68 be used in a 246c
Only because I have a 20 lt drum of 68 Thanks
Far too heavy for your climate. You need a 32.
The only thing that really concerns me with electric fans is how well they hold up to water. I'm someone who likes to pressure wash/steam clean the coolers and machine often.
Ok thanks again Nige
The manual calls for an SAE10W hydraulic oil. Viscosity-wise that's somewhere between ISO22 & 32. TBH if you don't have a manual you should really get one, especially if you are doing your own maintenance. For your S/N search online for SEBU8109. It's US$75 to download a pdf version from the Cat Publications website, or you can get it for US$49 + shipping from HERE .
Hydraulic Fan problems Hi 246c 2010 Fan motor leaked out of top shaft seal not bad but was leaking , i fitted a new complete seal kit it was working but seemedto me to be moving to slow even when i unpluggedthe solid made no difference It worked fine for a few days but got hot and now the fan is not turning on its own even when the engine is 100c , i can turn it while the engine is running by hand but wont keep going , hydraulic system seems fine re drive and lifting the loader. Is there a valve or something to detect the hyd oil to the fan motor ? When i replaced the seals the motor was in good condition as wear goes no scoring at all . I dont have access to a hyd pressure gauge Any help would be greatly appreciated
Hi Guys Im going to replace the hyd fan motor with electric. Hyd piping ? If i put the pressure to the motor side pipe into the return other side of the motor it runs to the hyd filter on the back door , im thinking thats fine. Will it be ok just to plug the small pipe going to the cooler from the motor ( think its a bypass pipe) 2010 246c scid steer Thanks
Think it should be ok as there used in cars all the time rain is not a problem , ill be carefulif i need to pressureclean it .