OK, quick recap from last week. 580SE with 7000 hrs for sale. Full cab, loader with material bucket only and no hoe- but a 40" Dutchman tree spade. The 4WD is not working but the front driveshaft has power from the transfer case to the front diff. Planetary covers have not been off. When rotating front wheels by hand you can see the u-joints turning normally. Driveshaft yoke is tight and clearly not stripped on the input shaft. Everything in the front end rotates smoothly, no grinding, no binding. I pulled the drain plug in the diff and found no real metal of any significance. Could it be as simple as a sheared pin? If so, I wouldn't think the parts would be that expensive? The only other thing I am a little concerned with this machine is this. With the machine at idle, I can hear and feel a fluttering effect at the air filter (I just took off the rubber boot drain cap). To me it sounds a little like when an intake valve is not seating 100% and there is some compression push-back into the intake. Should I be real concerned about this, the engine was not fully warmed up and it does have a lot of hours on it?
When you turn one front wheel by hand, does the opposite wheel turn also, in either direction, or the drive shaft? If not then my guess would be snapped inner axle shaft since you have no noise and little metal debris. I think there's supposed to be a fluttering effect at that rubber boot, that's what pushes the bigger particles out through the rubber lips.
If we rotate one wheel the opposite one turns.
..... the engine problem could be 1) a bad valve 2) very loose tappets 3) worn out camshaft - as a result of running loose tappets over a long period...... Combined with the 4wd problem - you may need some serious $$$ spent on it.
Now that's just weird. One would expect clunks, clang, bangs, and kibbles and bits of metal in the sump.
alrman, that's disappointing to hear for sure, but that was my gut feeling also. Does anyone else know about this rubber boot fluttering effect being normal? I also checked and there is no turbocharger. I thought the S in "SE" meant it was a "Super E" meaning turbocharged? lantraxco, I was surprised too, I thought metal and noise, or at least one of the two.
Did some research on dust unloaders (Earlier referred to as a rubber boot drain cap) in my earlier post. Here's what I found: "DUST UNLOADER Filed April 21, 1965 INVENTOR Another object is a dust discharge device for an air cleaner which will automatically allow dust, separated from the air, to be discharged from the housing in response to a certain dust head pressure or build-up in response to the engine created air pressure differential. The important point is that the unloader should have at least two generally parallel, closely spaced, highly flexible lips defining a discharge slot. Also, the adapter and upper portion of the unloader provide a sufficiently large chamber so that dust may accumulate. It will be understood that a certain accumulation of dust will cause a head pressure above the lips 70 which, at a predetermined head pressure, will cause the lips to separate and flex outwardly, thereby opening up the discharge slot letting dust escape from the housing through the unloader. The invention works particularly well with a 1 to 6 cylinder engine where the staggered intake pulsations of the cylinders are perceptible in the intake. With a large number of cylinders, for example 8 or 12, the intake pulsations may be so close together that the pulses at the intake are not sufficiently perceptible to be effective. In any event, where they are definite and perceptible, they cause a pulsating of the lips "ill which increases the effectiveness of the unloading action".
Yair . . . Well silly me! All these years I've been thinking those things were just held together by engine suction and dumped when the revs came off . . . the same way a mesh engine screen clears itself of leaves. Cheers
Hey Scrub, reminds me of a once popular bumper sticker around these parts (back when cars had actual bumpers) "There is no gravity, the earth sucks!"