L2800-L3400 PTO Making the right choice

[k0ua]

Mine has no over-running clutch at all. It has a 2-stage clutch however. The way it works is, the first half of the pedal travel coming off the floorboards engages the PTO clutch and spins up whatever implement you have attached. The second half of the travel is dedicated to engaging the drive wheels. Using a rotary cutter as an example, all your maneuvering can be achieved by depressing the clutch halfway and never disengaging the PTO clutch at all.

This is the way I operate now, for the first little while I wasn't used to using the 2-stage clutch and wasn't confident I was using it correctly. What I didn't like about using the rotary cutter without using the 2-stage clutch was that you were always engaging and disengaging the PTO clutch and slipping it quite a lot due to the high inertia load. Since the engine went back to idle every time you made a 2 point turn, re-engaging the PTO clutch on a quickly spinning cutter would wear the clutch disc more than I wanted. I'm all about taking it easy on things like clutches.

Now when I have to stop and turn, I use only the first half of the clutch pedal to make the turn, leaving the cutter spinning and engaged while the tractor ground speed may be nil. The engine acts as a very effective brake to bring the cutter speed down. If I plan to stop for a while and disengage the PTO, the cutter is turning at idle speed within about 3 seconds of releasing the throttle. The L3400 has enough torque to spin the cutter back up to full 540 PTO speed from idle within about 2-3 seconds as you finish your turn.

There is never any ratcheting sound at all.

There's a definite "step" in the clutch effort you can feel as you're about to disengage the PTO clutch. Very easy to drive once you get a feel for it.

Sean

Aha, I see, it is quite a bit different than the B7500DT I had. it makes sense now, that the engine dynamic braking if you left off of the throttle would spin it down pretty quick since it is directly connected thru the clutch plate. Of course as you know on the L3400HST model I had, the PTO just continued to spin at 540 as you changed directions unless you pushed in the clutch which you would not normally do unless you were finished and wanted to disengage the PTO. Thanks for explaining it.

James K0UA

 

[cville97]

I stopped by the dealership this morning. Spoke with multiple people and no one offered any good insite. One guy remembered that the cams had been redesigned. Understandably, they didn't want to speculate as to what the problem might be. They'll be picking it up next Wednesday and will take a look and give me an estimate to repair it. I'll post what I find out next week.

I'm also going to have them look at the 3PH valve while they have it. I also have the jerking problem. Does anyone know if there is a replacement valve that fixes this problem? Or is it a matter of properly adjusting the existing valve?

Thank you,
Jason

 

[Chilly807]

Jason,

The older L3400s like yours (going by the serial number) had a worse version of the 3-point valve than what's currently available. While the new one isn't perfect, it's better than the old type. Ask your dealer if they can determine which valve is currently in your tractor, if it IS the original the newer type should improve the situation to some degree. In my opinion it can't be 100% fixed. If they adjust either valve to the specs in the workshop manual it introduces another problem which is worse as far as I'm concerned.

I went through this with mine last year, I ended up adjusting the valve back to where the factory had set it before shipping. Mine has a version of the valve that was mid-production. Not the worst but not the latest either. You'll have to decide whether the newer style valve is worth the expense to change it.

If you do a search for L3400 and jerky 3-point hitch some of the old threads will show up. It's a real saga.

Sean

 

[cville97]

Jason,

The older L3400s like yours (going by the serial number) had a worse version of the 3-point valve than what's currently available. While the new one isn't perfect, it's better than the old type. Ask your dealer if they can determine which valve is currently in your tractor, if it IS the original the newer type should improve the situation to some degree. In my opinion it can't be 100% fixed. If they adjust either valve to the specs in the workshop manual it introduces another problem which is worse as far as I'm concerned.

I went through this with mine last year, I ended up adjusting the valve back to where the factory had set it before shipping. Mine has a version of the valve that was mid-production. Not the worst but not the latest either. You'll have to decide whether the newer style valve is worth the expense to change it.

If you do a search for L3400 and jerky 3-point hitch some of the old threads will show up. It's a real saga.

Sean

Thank you, Sean. I will ask the dealer to include the latest 3PH valve in their estimate. I checked out some of the other threads and it sounds like it's just a poor design (On/Off control).

Jason

 

[Chilly807]

Like I said, I don't know how much the newest valve will improve the situation. With mine, it wasn't worth buying the latest valve for who knows how much improvement. I think they're fairly pricey, around $500 for the part plus the labour to change it.

You may want to ask them to record the existing settings, so they can re-adjust back to those if the WSM settings don't work well. If you didn't see it in one of the previous threads, the original factory setting differs greatly from what's listed in the WSM. After trying to adjust mine, I reverted back to the original setting to get the best performance.

Good luck with the tractor, I'm pretty sure one of the guys here went through the over-running clutch cam problem with his. I think it was teg, but I could be wrong.

Sean

 

[cville97]

Like I said, I don't know how much the newest valve will improve the situation. With mine, it wasn't worth buying the latest valve for who knows how much improvement. I think they're fairly pricey, around $500 for the part plus the labour to change it.

You may want to ask them to record the existing settings, so they can re-adjust back to those if the WSM settings don't work well. If you didn't see it in one of the previous threads, the original factory setting differs greatly from what's listed in the WSM. After trying to adjust mine, I reverted back to the original setting to get the best performance.

Good luck with the tractor, I'm pretty sure one of the guys here went through the over-running clutch cam problem with his. I think it was teg, but I could be wrong.

Sean

Good idea to have them record the existing settings. If the problem with the WSM settings is the drop in the hitch when using the front loader, I think I could live with that over a jerky hitch. I've also heard that the valve from the L3010 Grand L could be a worthwhile replacement for the older L3400s that have the first generation 3PH valve. I'll be asking the dealer to look into that as well.

Jason

 

[Chilly807]

Sounds like you've got a good handle on the 3 point issues, some of the confusion over the different valves stems from the fact that Kubota has made so many changes over the past several years, probably hoping for a "silver bullet". I'm not 100% sure, but the dealer should be able to go back to Kubota and request the build record of your tractor by serial number and determine which valve you have in there now if it hasn't already been changed. Most haven't.
I have a parts breakdown somewhere which lists the different valves and where the serial number breaks were in the production history. I'll see if I can dig it out. I think yours is either 1st or 2nd generation, but I'd have to look to be sure.

Sean

 

[cville97]

Sounds like you've got a good handle on the 3 point issues, some of the confusion over the different valves stems from the fact that Kubota has made so many changes over the past several years, probably hoping for a "silver bullet". I'm not 100% sure, but the dealer should be able to go back to Kubota and request the build record of your tractor by serial number and determine which valve you have in there now if it hasn't already been changed. Most haven't.
I have a parts breakdown somewhere which lists the different valves and where the serial number breaks were in the production history. I'll see if I can dig it out. I think yours is either 1st or 2nd generation, but I'd have to look to be sure.

Sean

Thanks, Sean. I think the parts breakdown might be helpful if it's easy to get at. The dealership picked up the tractor on Wednesday (4/17), but I haven't heard anything yet. I called on Friday and they said they should know something by early next week.

I'm concerned that I'm going to spend a lot of money to get this fixed, only to have to do it again down the road because either (1) they didn't put in the correct cams, or (2) there is no "correct" cam for my serial number. I would even consider trading it in for an L3800 (the only one that would be compatible with my backhoe). It looks like there's no PTO problem for the L3800, as it is an independent PTO, but it doesn't sound like they've solved the jerky 3PH problem. Any thoughts?

Jason

 

[Chilly807]

To the best of my knowledge, the PTO on the L3800 is listed as "live - continuous", I don't think there's been any significant change to it from the L3400. Mine isn't independent, I think the old L4400 or the new L4600 is the only one in the L series that is independent.

Since I don't have the over-running clutch, I haven't dug into when the "improved cams" were implemented, if there is such a thing. I would think if the dealer had to order the cams for your tractor, they would get the latest version of them. I don't hear much about the cam problem these days, I think if people were still having failures it would be a hot topic here considering how many of us have the L series tractors.

The 3-point system has been improved since the early L3400's were introduced, but as far as I'm concerned it's still not right. I tested a new L3800 with a chipper on the hitch on a dealer's lot last spring, it was a little bit better than mine but still far from smooth. Some people are quite happy with them, unfortunately I'm not one of them. Still, it's not a show-stopper, more of an annoyance and a safety concern if you're not careful hooking implements.

Sean

 

[ccsial]

I posted this a while back but it may be good to do it again.