Hydraulic oil or Tractor fluid?

[Wayne County Hose]

I have a test bench in my shop for when I rebuild hydraulic cylinders. All cylinders get filled with oil and pressure tested. Now some equipment takes straight hydraulic oil, some take tractor fluid, some take 30 weight oil, etc. Is there one oil I could run in my test unit which would be okay if some oil from this freshly rebuilt cylinder went into the equipment's system? I like to return the cylinder to the customer filled with oil so there are no "bleeding" concerns. I also donlt like filling a cylinder with oil, testing it, then have to purge it. Sometimes, it can get messy.

Thanks, Andy.

 

[DieselPower]

A couple of repair shops I sell to use UTF for testing. Basically the UTF (universal tractor fluid) is nothing more than a heavily fortified hydraulic oil that also contains friction modifiers for wet clutch/brakes, EP (extreme pressure) additives for when the oil is used as a gear oil and tends to be a better quality product all around. UTF fluid can be used in hydraulic systems so there should be no compatibility issues if the cylinder you test is later used on a hydraulics only system.

 

[Wayne County Hose]

Thank-you DieselPower, looks like UTF it is.

 

[Soundguy]

I'd agree.. I'd use UTF. Some people have common sump hds and rear end or tranny systems and would probably view the contamination of their rear end UTF oil with a few quarts or gallons of plain 'jack oil' as a really horrible thing. the utf will be a 'all bases covered' kind of thing.

soundguy