Rear wheels will not drive but front wheels do

[willgardner]

Gday from Australia

I have a strange thing happening to my tractor and before I spend thousands having it trucked to a repair centre I thought I would ask the forums.

I was doing some work recently and after a whole bunch of ugly grinding noises I no longer get drive from the rear wheels.
When the tractor is engaged into 4WD the front wheels work, but no drive comes from the rear in 2WD or 4WD.

The tractor is a Deutz Fahr 4.50 and I have, after a lot of time and effort, located a transmission manual.
I'm willing to get under the tractor and pull out the parts that are broken.
My problem is that I'm a part time farmer and don't know where to start.

Does anyone have any suggestions as to what might have broken?

Cheers

Will

 

[Rosher18]

My first intuition is that some of the rear differential parts may have thrown in the proverbial towel.

If there is a separate rear differential case, drain that oil and see what comes out. If it's a combined gearbox-diff-hydraulic bath, check that fluid and see if metal pieces come out.

 

[RickB]

Broken differential half shaft. Does it have a differential lock? Engage it, see if it drives on one side of the rear.

 

[willgardner]

My first intuition is that some of the rear differential parts may have thrown in the proverbial towel.

If there is a separate rear differential case, drain that oil and see what comes out. If it's a combined gearbox-diff-hydraulic bath, check that fluid and see if metal pieces come out.

Thanks Rosher18
I will have a go at this but unfortunately it won't be until the weekend.
I'll post what I find.

 

[willgardner]

Broken differential half shaft. Does it have a differential lock? Engage it, see if it drives on one side of the rear.

Thanks RickB.
I tried that previously and no it did not drive at all even with diff lock engaged.
Possibly both sides are broken, if that's how it works.

 

[Wagtail]

G'day Cobber and welcome to TBN from Tassie. (even though you joined before me )

Is yours the DX 4.50?

 

[willgardner]

G'day Cobber and welcome to TBN from Tassie. (even though you joined before me )

Is yours the DX 4.50?

Gday mate.

Yes it is the Deutz Fahr DX 4.50.
I've managed to pick up copies of the Operators Manual/Instruction Book and the Power Train/Transmission/Workshop Manual.
The manuals show a lot of pictures (see image attached to this post) but they aren't really labelled very well as to what each component does.

I was advised by Deutz Fahr Australia to use my local dealer, but I'm in Moss Vale and they are about 60km away in Nowra, over a couple of steep valleys, so we would have to get a special truck to pick the tractor up and take it there which will be expensive.
I was hoping to pull open the transmission, take out what's broken, order new parts (from Germany?) then put it all back together.

Having never pulled apart a gearbox before I'm not sure where to start.
Any suggestions?

Will

 

[Wagtail]

I understand your dilemma, especially regarding the Kangaroo Valley drive. The reason that I asked if yours is the DX was to clarify in case there was a typo as there is a 4.51 model with no prefix. I quickly looked it up via Tractordata.com (a very handy site, by the way) but they didn't have too much information on your transmission other than how many gears FWD/REV: TractorData.com Deutz-Fahr DX 4.5 tractor transmission information

Seeing as the front wheels are engaging, whilst in 4x4, then something must be working/spinning/connecting in your transmission. So at least you can move the tractor to your shop or work area. Hmmm...

I'd give the Nowra dealership a ring and talk to their service department. Ask their advice & perhaps they've got a mobile repair ute that could come to you. My dealership's got several mobile repair utes for 'field' work. It'd be cheaper than floating there & back.

 

[Wagtail]

Another suggestion is to look at the bottom of this page in the area Similar Threads.

It may help. :confused3:

 

[willgardner]

Thanks again everyone for the comments so far.

A quick update is that I managed to get a tractor mechanic out today to take a look.
Unfortunately he concluded that the problem is in the rear diff and the only way to get at it is to crack open the entire back of the tractor.
It will need to be trucked to their workshop and from there the various jacks, cranes and pulleys can be used to pull it all apart.
We didn't try to check the oil in the diff but I will have a go at that just to see if there are metal chips in it.

It won't be cheap but hopefully at the end of this I will have a working tractor.