Muffler Life?

[BugsRLB]

I will be putting the third muffler on to my BX23 soon. It just falls apart at the bolt flange end.
700+- hours on the machine. Just seem to not be lasting!

 

[ultrarunner]

So far muffler ok at 500 hours…

My air cleaner bracket fatigued and had to improvise…

 

[Slowpoke Slim]

I will be putting the third muffler on to my BX23 soon. It just falls apart at the bolt flange end.
700+- hours on the machine. Just seem to not be lasting!

Are you putting on "factory" parts?

I have a Stanley muffler on mine you can buy at TSC, paid $38 for it. Been on there almost 5 years now. No issues, no leaks, no cracks, nada.

 

[BugsRLB]

Yes factory. A new Kubota muffler is $264! Outrageous!
Will try TSC.
Thanx

 

[5030]

Never had a muffler fail on any of my big frame Kubota's and the oldest one has 6000 hours plus on it. Sounds to me like an easy weld job. Just brazed up a muffler for my dealer that came off a Case Magnum turbo farm tractor. Bracket broke and rubbed a hole in the can. New muffler was almost a grand. Farmers are cheap, I'm one as well.

 

[bmaverick]

10 years on mine. It's similar construction for a Japan tractor model.

Yes, its time you look for something better.

 

[rockinbbar]

It seems to me like a DPF will sure shorten the life of an exhaust system.

Not sure if they are all burning that hot, but if you see one re-gen at night, chances are the entire exhaust system will be glowing orange from the heat...

That HAS to shorten the life of exhaust parts.

 

[rScotty]

I will be putting the third muffler on to my BX23 soon. It just falls apart at the bolt flange end.
700+- hours on the machine. Just seem to not be lasting!

That's not common at all. Mufflers often last as long as tractors. But it is easy to see the problem with the BX23.

When you have a muffler or anything like a muffler, mirror, canopy, or telephone pole that is cantilevered out like the BX23 muffler is, there is always a chance that it will break the joint where the cantilevered part is is connected to something rigid. Adding some vibration into a diaphram joint as shown, and the chance of failure becomes a certainty.
An excellent example of the wrong way to do it is shown in the picture below. Look at how the BX23 muffler uses three bolts to connect a diaphram to a rigid manifold. That has to cause cracking.

The easy solution is to give it some support at the far end.
That restricts the motion and dampens the vibration.
Every part on your tractor will benefit - including you.

Looking at your part on the BX23 picture below, site, I'd just run a couple of triangulated supports from either the engine or frame out to that exhaust pipe connection part # 050.
rScotty

 

[arto98607]

I agree 100% with rScotty regarding supporting the far end of the muffler!


Few months ago I had to replace a rusted out muffler in a piece of equipment and due to inlet / outlet orientation I was not able to find any aftermarket mufflers that were even close to fitting.

Instead of paying over $800 for OEM muffler, I decided to make my own and it has worked out very well.


This is what $800+ OEM muffler looks like:



Made one out of thick wall steel pipe:
(The soot is due to leaky original muffler)


Used flexible connection to a manifold.
There are couple of simple welded-on baffles inside:



Overall it was well worth the effort.

 

[BugsRLB]

I save $264 for a while. Welded it up and reinstalled.
Not pretty nut it works!