Thank you, I appreciate your reply. I looked at the link you provided and need to know, how many spools do I need for the lift and tilt function? Again, not very knowledgeable about hydraulics!
Thanks again.
Each spool controls one function. They are called spool valves because if you take them out of the housing they look like the old wooden spools that sewing thread was wound on.
A dual control valve is a bank of two spool valves. Each spool valve has three positions. In the middle it just allows the hydraulic pressure to return to the sump. Moved one way it will cause all the cylinders it is hooked to to extend, moved the other way and they will all contract.
Usually one spool controls the two bucket cylinders and the other spool controls the two lift arm cylinders. So you need a control valve with two spools.
The spools can be controlled individually with individual finger levers - that's probably what you have now. It's tricky to work a front end loader with individual levers for a couple of reasons: First off, small tractors often don't have enough hydraulic flow to do two functions at once. Without extra flow, you canboth at once by barely opening each spool, but that brings up another problem in that cheaper contol valves often don't have their machining accurate enough to meter low flow well when just barely opened.
I happen to like individual lever controls, but only if they are hooked to a high dollar control valve with good low speed control. I build rock walls with a backhoe, and want to be able to move the bucket tip half an inch at full power but very slowly.
Your needs might be different.
A joystick is just a device with some ball joints and monkey motion that operates both levers at the same time. Your fingers can do the same thing - it's just training. Like playing a musical instrument. For my use, a joystick can never be as accurate as levers because there are extra joints in a joystick & each one has a tiny bit of slop. Again, your use may be entirely different.
It would help if we knew why you want to change the control valve.
rScotty
