Hi, I just bought a 953 and I want to go through and clean everything and service everything before I start running it. I pulled the covers off the track tensioners one side was packed in mud and the other side just had grease in it which I expected. I assume underneath the cover in the cavity where the grease is to lengthen the tracks it’s capable of draining on the mud not in there the grease in the bottom of there is there anyway I can spray that out with a hot steam cleaner or power washer and the water will drain out of there or am I gonna have to scoop it out there with a small cup? 1988 cat 953
No plugs that I know off or seen when I had mine apart. I used a putty knife and stuck my small vacuum cleaner in there as far as I could. You could maybe hose it out into a muddy slurry and try to vacuum it out. It’s tough to get in there. The main thing is to keep the spring and tensioner tube clean. My spring was rotted and broken into 5 pieces.
Is there a process to get the housing that conceals the spring and all that a part to inspect and clean? Is the tensioner tube visible in photo?
Not that I know of. Mines a 1982 though. You would have to take it all apart which is a big job. If you split the tracks and pull the idler forward and get the tensioner rod out of the way you can get your arm in there easier. You can use an inspection mirror and flash light to look at some of the spring. No one knew why mine would bend the tensioner rod because there was no way to really inspect the spring easily. I imagine no one cleans these housings out because it isn’t easy.
The tensioner tube would be inside the spring. The tube outer flange would be what sits against the 2 pins that holds the spring tension which you can see. The square piece that you grease to adjust track tension is what slides into that tube. Reason I bring it up is because I checked into replacing the tube when I rebuilt mine and it was getting rare and was really expensive from cat and no aftermarket. It would suck if it rotted out so I cleaned it up and painted it when I had it apart.