The swing motor gear box would not hold oil on my 892 so I removed it and the lower seal was ripped, torn and looked like it had been hit by some object. The cavity under the unit where the gear meshes with the ring gear is full of water covered by a skim of oil. the seal likely was damaged by ice at some point when the water was froze and the machine operated. My question is should there not be a drain for water out of this area or is the water not supposed to be able to get there. There was no gasket sealing the swing gear to the excavator, and the bolts that hold it in place didn't seem to be sealed but there is a lot of water for just those two areas to be leaking. Any help would be appreciated, Thanks in advance. John
That pan is designed to hold the grease the swing gear pinion runs in, so no there's no open drain to my knowledge. There are some rubber seals on the swing bearing that may be damaged or missing. I don't recall but where the lines go to the swivel joint, is it possible for rain water to leak through to that pan?
There is a cover on the bottom of the pan accessed from the hole in the carbody where the swivel is. It will usually be on the travel motor side of the carbody. There are two bolts in it and if there is water and oil in the pinion tub, it will gush out when you knock the cover loose. I usually had a drum sawed off on the bottom third and stuffed under the carbody and use a long bar to pop the cover loose to avoid the falling fluid. Once the cover is open use the boom and lift the opposite end of the carbody up to drain as much of the crud as possible out. Good Luck!
Thanks for the info I will have a look in morning and see if I can drain the pan. Thanks again, John
Thanks JohnC the plate was there and is off and cavity drained. Question for you and Lantraxco is how much grease should be in there and how is the gear and turntable bearing lubricated. There is only the single grease zerk out the front, do you pump in grease and rotate a bit and pump in more. I have the swing gear out rite now and can pack in a bunch thru the opening. Any adivce would be appreciated. John.
Underneath the boom or in the compartment to the left of the boom as you look at the front of the machine there will be another plate with two bolts in it. This time we are looking at the top floor of the house. If you remove that cover you will be looking at the top of the ring gear. I made a plugger by taking the T handle out of an old grease gun. I brazed the head end solid and then installed the seal back on. When I put grease in the tub I just takes a new grease tube and use the plugger to shove the grease out of the tube and into the tub. I'll have someone in the cab turn the house a little bit and push another tube in. I'll work my way around like this till I run into the grease at the place where I started. What you will see then is a floor of grease, some smearing of grease on the ring gear teeth and a ledge of grease that will be toward the center of the machine. When you see that ledge you will be fine. Most machines that I've looked at have never had that cover off and you can feel the vibration in the house when you rotate. It is a dead give away that there will be sharp shiny stuff mixed in with the grease. The bearing up and down will be good but the vibration will bother the heck out of good operator.
Thanks John C will be back at tomorrow morning to put back together. I'll check my stock I may have a pail of EP grease out in the shop from another project that I could use up on this one. Will this lube the turn table bearing or is that done by the front grease zerk on the house. Thanks again, John
I used fill them out of a pale. I would take the pump part of the grease gun off and stick the tube in the grease and pull the plunger out sucking the grease into the tube. Then I would let the spring in the tube push the grease out into the tub. There should be two fittings for doing the turntable bearing. One in front and one on the opposite side. Put a couple of pumps in and spin the house each way a couple of times. You only need to do that about every 40 to 80 hours.
Thanks again for the help on this unit. Everything went back together and used a pail of EP2 grease in the turntable pan and it works perfectly.. it's a pain when someone else has been in a unit and screwed it up, likely better off if they had just left it alone.. Much appreciated, John