My 3 tonne loader has an automatic gearbox / transmition, separate from the hydraulics. Put it in gear, accelerate and it goes, this is the fluid drive so to speak. It takes 40 litres of oil which I changed today. The oil, while it looked clean smelt burnt. The oil was last changed 300 hours ago. Does anyone have any comment on the strong burnt smell? It was like the burnt smell of oil in a wet clutch. Curious!
One more thing, when we burnt out a wet clutch on an MX bike, the smell was the same, but I believe there is no fibre plates that I am aware of in the Auto Gearbox of a loader, so really wondering what it is....
If you have an oil sample lab somewhere fairly close, send them a sample. It will tell you what may be getting ready to fail. As to the smell, lots of the additives in oil react to heat and can generate that smell even in a system that has no clutch plates that slip and burn the oil such as a final drive. If your machine has a hydrostat transmission there should be no clutch plates to slip, however the oil can become burnt through heat caused by many things, such as leakage inside the system. Oil sampling will help loads in giving you a direction to look.
Hopefully nothing is getting ready to fail, the machine has only has 330 hours on it, the oil was first changed about 50 hours, but it was done by a mechanic so I did not see/smell it. This change was done by me, the first time I have done such a task on this type of machine, hence was surprised at the smell, it reminded me of when the boy used to race MX and I changed the oil....... a burnt clutch in a two stroke.
What type of machine is this? Are the brakes internal to this housing? Machines with wet brakes built in will smell burnt, like Manitou rough terrain forklifts. When the front diff oil is changed it smells horrible, due to the brake material running in the oil .Same as a two-stroke mx engine clutch