It has NOTHING to do with traction. Some moron at Bobcat who obviously never drove a Bobcat had no idea what he was talking about, so he called this stupid thing a "traction" lock. He should have called it a hydraulic brake or motion lock.................or better yet, just leave the stinking thing on his drawing board and off the Bobcat!!!
This kind of crap is what you do when you don't have anything TO do, and the boss says "Will you DO something". His co-workers didn't have anything to do one day either, so they came up with the ignorant idea to put a computer on them! While they serve NO intelligent purpose at all they bring in a LOT of revenue to the service departments, and cost you a LOT of money in the process.
Try buying an axle seal or bearing for a Bobcat some day! Bobcat bastardizes the diameters so you have to buy them from Bobcat or a re-seller - like on Ebay. There isn't a parts store in the US that can get you a bearing or seal to fit a Bobcat.
I got one for ya - the 553 I just bought was missing a wheel and 5 lugnuts. Try finding a 14 mm fine-threaded lugnut that's got a 1" hex on it. Unless you go to Bobcat, IT AIN'T GONNA HAPPEN!!! Deere and Holland both use SAE nuts on their skid loaders, and not even Fastnal has them!!!!
Thius is all part of Bobcat's way of showing you how "friendly" their machines are to work on!!!!