"Floating a FEL?"

[yaouk]

I read somewhere on this site the other day about 'floating' the FEL bucket so that it glided (if thats a word) over the ground without digging in.
My FEL (on a 25hp) always wants to dig in. Do some loaders have a special 'float' setting or is it just a matter of tilting the bucket up?

[MChalkley]

yaouk - All loaders have a float position in the lift circuit, as far as I know. If you push the loader joystick all the way forward, it should click into position. This lets the loader "float" up and down, but it will still tend to dig in when you push it forward, unless the bucket is perfectly flat. In fact, in many cases, it'll tend to dig in even when flat, so you may even have to tilt it back a bit. For this reason, float position is generally most effective when backdragging.

[beenthere]

Yes, some of them do have a float position. The down position of the FEL on the control stick can be pushed into a detent position, where it will stay. This neither puts down pressure or lift to the arms, allowing them to float the bucket on the ground. Then the bucket tilt lever can be used to position the edge of the bucket relative to the ground.

[HR_Mutt]

yaouk
<font color=blue>float' setting or is it just a matter of tilting the bucket up?</font color=blue>. I use both, fel in float and tilt the cutting edge of the bucket up. Rear of bucket acts like a big skid shoe and leading edge won't dig in. Works well for pushing snow long distances without emptying.
regards
Mutt

[Harv]

<font color=blue>float position is generally most effective when backdragging</font color=blue>

Good for backdragging fer sure, but I use it more for initially positioning the bucket before attacking something like a pile of dirt. If I try to manually place it at just the right level for skimming the ground, I'm always off by an inch or two. Even if my goal is to place the bucket slightly above the ground, I find floating it first gives me a good reference point to start from.

Could be that experience makes this less necessary, but at the rate I'm going I'll never get that much experience.

[MChalkley]

Harv - Agreed. Without a good level indicator, that's about the only way to do it. I didn't think about the float position in that context, but I've probably used it more often for that purpose than any other, too.