Review - Kubota Shop Manual (WSM)

[RobJ]

Just got my L2500 shop manual. About $80 from a company that's on this site.

About what I expected from previous expierence. The manual is a double sided printed PDF file in black and white. Has some real pictures that are not that clear (compared to say one of my Clymer ATV shop mauals). Some of the pictures are pen and ink drawings. These are quite clear. I had a 85 MAxima manual that almost all the pictures were in pen and ink, really better than real pics. It has some good gereral info in the front, looks like the same as my owners manual. It has all the torque info which is what I mostly needed. Some foldouts of the transmission and some of the electrical. It's about 350 pages if I recall. About 1" thick printed double sided. After a quick look I'm going to have to give it a 6 maybe 7 on a 1-10. It reads pretty easy but may be lacking some detail. The lack of being printed on a press is a big minus. I'll have to review it more while heading home on the bus.

But if you want to know more about your tractor, educate yourself when the dealer talks to you about service on your tractor....save the money you would normally spend on painting scratches on your boxblade )) and buy one of these. IMO every tractor owner should have one. If you don't have the owners manual (bought a used tractor like me) and want to buy one for $20 or so, spend the extra on this. Pretty much has both in this one. Wish I had known that one ahead of time.

Rob

 

[InlineDieselFan]

I have the shop manual also for my L3430, and have bought them for my past two trucks. I will agree everything is not totally clear, but I have already saved some money by being able to do a few things, and trouble shoot them instead of going to the dealer.

steve

 

[KubotaTerry]

I bought the WSM for my 3400HST. Even more expensive since you have to buy the base manual for the 2800/3400 and then the supplement for the HST version. I was pretty dissapointed with the quailty and the contents. There's obviously some good info in there, but not near what I was hopeing for. The quality of the pics was not good at all. To top it off, mine looked like the toner cartridge was running low when they printed it, so some of the pages are pretty light. Makes the pictures even harder to see. No binding. It is 3-hole punched, so you can put in in a 3-hole binder.
The biggest dissapointment was the contents. Not much there. Lots of "white space". Some of the procedures I read were translated so badly that I couldn't make heads or tails out of what they were trying to say.

I guess it's the best thing out there since it's the only thing out there, but I'll be glad when someone gets around to making an aftermarket manual.

Terry

 

[texbaylea]

I have the WSM for the Grand L series and thought it fairly well done. Not very many pictures but they were clear, mostly crisp line drawings. It may have something with the age of the series as the Grand L's have been around some time. It may also have to do with the popularity of the series that dictates how much effort is put into the manuals.

Vernon

 

[Volfandt]

I bought a WSM on CD for my BX23 off of ebay and all of the pic's were easy follow drawings, all were CAD or similar, no hand drawn.
I like the basic theory thats included in each section as I'm no expert on hydraulic nor diesel design & repair.

It's a great resource and if'n I would have been thinking clearly I would have ordered a hard copy when I bought the BX23.

Volfandt

 

[5030]

Why not go to a dealer and by an authorized factory shop manual like I did. Then you get everything including color fold out wiring diagrams. Kubota Factory Shop manuals come in a nice vynil clad 3 ring binder with an update card to mail in.

The copycats are criminals at best. Every shop manual is copyrighted for a reason.

 

[RobJ]

Why not go to a dealer and by an authorized factory shop manual like I did. Then you get everything including color fold out wiring diagrams. Kubota Factory Shop manuals come in a nice vynil clad 3 ring binder with an update card to mail in.

The copycats are criminals at best. Every shop manual is copyrighted for a reason.

I did on mine. No color, no binder, just a re printed pdf. But I was expecting what I got.

Maybe the dealers service department get the real deal.

 

[Sully2]

I did on mine. No color, no binder, just a re printed pdf. But I was expecting what I got.

Maybe the dealers service department get the real deal.

My service manual for my B3030 NOR my FEL came in any 3 ring binder?? Spiral wound pages is all. I had to send the tractor manual back because a lot of the line drawings were so light or didnt even exist..so you couldnt see any parts. Took Kubota about 3 weeks to get a new printing from the people that print them and Fed-X it back to me.

 

[ovrszd]

My service manual for my B3030 NOR my FEL came in any 3 ring binder?? Spiral wound pages is all. I had to send the tractor manual back because a lot of the line drawings were so light or didnt even exist..so you couldnt see any parts. Took Kubota about 3 weeks to get a new printing from the people that print them and Fed-X it back to me.

So I guess that answers my question which was where can I get a factory manual. Obviously it's not from Kubota. When we buy a new grader we always get an operators, service and parts manual from Deere. They are just like the parts counter uses, bound and all. I just assumed I could buy something similar for my B2910 from Kubota??? Can I not???

 

[MadReferee]

In May 2003 I bought a genuine Kubota Workshop Manual for my B2710. The manual covers the B2410/B2710/B2910. I came with tabs and was 3-hole punched and is well over 1" thick. I supplied the binder. It's all black and white with very detailed, clear and easy to read, diagrams. No photos. It's the same manual used by the shop service guys.

Part # 97897-12271 cost was $82