Hello everyone, I'm new to this site and am happy to be apart of a heavy equipment forum! I just purchased a 1997 TB045 excavator with 5,400 hours. I've been running it for about 2 weeks with no problem. All of a sudden I am now experiencing loss of hydraulic power followed by the engine stalling after using it for about an hour. Sometimes it will start hard, requiring me to turn it over for a few minutes when its cold.... it will eventually lug and then run for a while until stalling out under load. Does anyone know what this could be? Maybe its a common issue with this model? Thank you very much in advance! Kyle
Sounds as if the fuel system supply is plugged. Disassemble and clean the opaque separator bowl. Make sure that the shutoff valve on the separator is fully ON. Remove the line closest to the separator shutoff, after removing the fuel cap, and blow back through the line. You should be able to make bubbles in the fuel tank easily, even by mouth. And, it almost goes without saying that I've never had a Yanmar engine machine run more than 400 hours before the fuel filter was beyond it's service life. The machine also has an electric fuel pump. You should hear it running at key on/ engine off. As for the hard starting cold, they start best at 1/8-1/4 throttle, after preheating.
Thanks heymccall, I appreciate your help. So far I removed and cleaned the separator bowl, checked the valve and the blew through the line. The tank did bubble. I also checked the fuel pump and that is working fine as well. I will be picking up the fuel filter soon and will see how that effects things. Ill keep you posted. Thanks again.
Well its been about a year and I'm still struggling a bit. Shortly after my last post I changed the fuel filter and it ran ok for a while.... but then it would start acting up, so I'd change the filter again. Currently, I start the excavator, run it for about 10 minutes and it will start bogging down under load. So I'll start digging or tracking and the engine will begin to lose power, I stop what I'm doing and it will either slowly come back to rpm or stall. I am clueless, does anyone know what this could be? I'm desperate! Thanks
I was running a backhoe that started doing the exact same thing. Turned out it was a clogged fuel filter, but you have changed that. I do agree with everyone that it sounds like a fuel issue. One thing that came up when I was troubleshooting the New Holland was the air vent in the fuel tank being clogged. Try running it with the fuel cap off. After that.....I dunno...injectors or pump?
There's a few ways to diagnose a fuel starvation issue. Run off a temporary tank, tee into the line and put a gauge in the cab so you can see what the pressure does, or take it apart and clean everything.
Finally figured it out
Glad you figured it out! Was it a rental machine before it was yours, I only ask because I could never imagine an owner/operator dropping that stuff in the tank and not retrieving it, unbelievable....
Oh I forgot to mention that, it was owned by a local contractor. I couldn't believe it!