Loader operation

[CraigM]

I recently had a chance to operate a friend's compact with a loader. It's not orange, but another major color about equivalent to my B2150 (24HP).
My tractor is scheduled for a loader as soon as the motion passes the finance comittee. This adds up to my never having operated a loader before climbing onto my friend's machine. After a bit of fumbling, I was able to make the thing go about where I wanted it to and so got a feel of how useful it could be. There were a few aspects of it's operation that made me wonder, so I want to compare notes with all of you.

I was surprised that I could not lift the front of the tractor with the bucket lowering cylinders. I have read many posts that talk about doing this for various reasons. I could raise the front if I put the level bucket on the ground and then rotated the bucket to the dump position, but could not lift the front end by lowereing the bucket in any position. I am sure that I wasn't accidentally activating float when I tried this as float was a very distinct detent beyond lower.

The other thing that made me wonder was that if I put a dumped bucket on the ground and backed up to scrape with the edge of the bucket, the edge of the bucket stayed exactly where I put it and the bucket curled as I backed up. The motion of the tractor overpowered the dump cylinders.

Are these things normal?

 

[Spencer]

Try having the bucket in the dump position first and then try lifting the front end off the gound with just straight down pressure.

 

[tc35dforme]

craig,

I think the manufacturer's limit the down force stroke on the main cylinders to prevent operators from trying to move mountains and hurting the machines. By not letting us dig too deep, they are indirectly attempting to prevent damage. C.U.T.'s aren't intended to be excavators or wheel loaders !!

As far as the back dragging part...that doesn't sound quite right. You should be able to drag without the bucket curling. I have often forced my front wheels up off the ground when I back drag over a rock or something.

Maybe your buddy has a weak valve or something !!??

 

[Carl_NH]

Craig,

With the FEL up and the bucket curled down it should lift the tractor off the ground easily when applying down pressure on the FEL.

Regarding your statement about bucket curling when backdragging this is not normal as the bucket should stay in the same postion unless you raise/lower the FEL or rotate the bucket intentionally.

It sounds like there is a problem with the FEL hydralics.

 

[Hoeman00]

It sounds like there is a problem with the FEL hydraulics.

I'll second that.
Unless the manufacture of the tractor he has set the pressure reliefs
low on purpose to keep someone from tearing this up.

What is the combo, would be helpful, as others may have the same set-up?

 

[BB_TX]

I have a JD 950 with JD75 FEL. I have had a flat a couple times on the front and used the FEL to raise the front wheels off the ground to take the wheel off.
Have also used it to raise the front wheels up so I could drive up on a flat bed trailer that had no ramps.

 

[Steven]

Does the bucket have a quick dump setting on the valve? If so this may leave the pressure off the cylinder if you curled bucket down and hit this spot on the valve. try curling bucket down to a set spot slowly and try to back drag again if this does not work then something is strange. If i dump the bucket on my bx22 with the quick dump valve setting the bucket seems to float until I reverse the bucket direction and curl back down under power, then it will back drag the top off of a pile of dirt and not move at all.

 

[CraigM]

Thank you all for confirming what I had assumed about the way the loader should operate.

Steven:
Next time we get together, i'll investigate this quick dump more. My buddy is about 5 hours away.

What is the purpose of this quick dump thing. You said it was in the valve, is it the same as float, or something different. Ahhh, as I'm typing, i'm realizing you mean a quick dump setting on the valve to quickly dump the contents of the bucket. I'm pretty sure that this is not the case on this tractor, but tell me more about this because it sounds like a nice feature. How does it work? I'm familiar with joysticks that have lower, raise and detented float in one axis, does your quick dump give a detented position on the curl axis also?

 

[Anonymous Poster]

The "quick dump" feature works by creating what is known as a regenerative circuit in hydraulics. That is, the hydraulic pressure is connected to both ends of the dump cylinder at the same time. At first thought, this doesn't sound like it should work, but it does! The pressure to the piston side creates a larger force than the rod side because it is pushing against a larger area. This forces the piston out and the flow from the rod side is channeled right back into the piston side (regenerates) and greatly increases the speed.

I am most familiar with Deere's implementation of this on the 4000 series. To get it to work you push the joy stick further to the right than normal. There isn't a clear detent feel. You can tell the difference if you first use the lockout lever to lock out the regenerative function (the "read the manual" position), and work the lever back and forth, then move the lockout lever to allow full movement and repeat.

Be aware that the cylinders on the loader have to be connected correctly for this to work, and that the regenerative function doesn't work well with many other hydraulic attachments and should be locked out.

Long explanation, but hope this clears the mud a bit.

 

[Steven]

Rogerh summed it up pretty good. the two dump positions are separated by a feel spot. the quick dump has a little more spring tention. you can notice this if you push lever to the right slowly, you can also test it by dumping a load of dirt, and pushing the lever all the way to the right. the first dump setting has good power for control and prcise dumping. I think it is called a 4 position bucket control valve. it's a feature used in a lot of larger tractors.