Difficult shifting to LO on L3940

[yucholian]

My L3940 has less than 10 hours.
However, it's difficult to shift into LO range on the hydro.
I've tried blurping the throttle, moving the FEL joystick, etc. It's been a tad difficult when I bought it, but wouldn't go in for almost 40 minutes this week. Dealer is picking it up for a looksie, but any thoughts?

 

[PHILIP8N]

Did you read your operators manual? Were you depressing clutch shifting from neutral to low? That would be my first suggestion. Slightly move your tractor forward or reverse with the HST pedal, then try shifting from neutral to low. My L3940HST-2 at 10 hours took a little effort to get into low, or maybe that was just me getting used to the tractor. Now at 50 hours, it shifts just fine, parts probably getting broken in now. Philip.

 

[KubieTwo]

My L3940 has less than 10 hours.
However, it's difficult to shift into LO range on the hydro.
I've tried blurping the throttle, moving the FEL joystick, etc. It's been a tad difficult when I bought it, but wouldn't go in for almost 40 minutes this week. Dealer is picking it up for a looksie, but any thoughts?

Gears are a combination of teeth and spaces. A transmission offers different ranges by connecting input shafts and output shafts through different size gears, which must run together, tooth of one gear in space of another. The shift requires meshing of two non-synchronized gears which will not always line up tooth to space. What you are experiencing is gear teeth to gear teeth and some rotation must take place to mesh. Neither moving the loader joystick nor "blurping" the throttle will cause this to happen.

Simultaneously attempt to make the shift by applying pressure in the required direction while very lightly rocking the HST pedal to forward or reverse and back to neutral to align the gears tooth to space. You are trying to turn a shaft only a few degrees, so slight pedal movement is all that is needed. It may take several iterations each shift until you get the feel for making it happen but you will feel the shift lever move into position as the gears align. Everything is still tight right now and takes a bit more effort than it will with more hours, but the gears must be aligned to make the shift. Under the right conditions, even with MANY hours on the tractor you may still need to use the same technique to shift ranges. Some see this as a "design flaw" or "safety issue" or .... and others accept it as part of operating a tractor instead of driving a Mercedes. I would tell you that 10 year old farm kids master this in two minutes but the safety police would swarm out of everywhere.

Hope this helps.

 

[yucholian]

Thanks for the responses.
It's a bit odd that the manual says the pedal has to be in neutral but also has you pushing forward/reverse to get the gears meshing.

 

[Grateful11]

Thanks for the responses.
It's a bit odd that the manual says the pedal has to be in neutral but also has
you pushing forward/reverse to get the gears meshing.

I may be way off but I think what it's doing when the clutch is depressed and
you're rocking the HST pedal you're removing any HST pressure that the gears
may be under. I find that it doesn't shift well into Low on a slope at all.

 

[PHILIP8N]

Thanks for the responses.
It's a bit odd that the manual says the pedal has to be in neutral but also has you pushing forward/reverse to get the gears meshing.

It may be odd, but did it work? What did the dealer say? Is everything working okay now? Philip.

 

[TripleR]

Gears are a combination of teeth and spaces. A transmission offers different ranges by connecting input shafts and output shafts through different size gears, which must run together, tooth of one gear in space of another. The shift requires meshing of two non-synchronized gears which will not always line up tooth to space. What you are experiencing is gear teeth to gear teeth and some rotation must take place to mesh. Neither moving the loader joystick nor "blurping" the throttle will cause this to happen.

Simultaneously attempt to make the shift by applying pressure in the required direction while very lightly rocking the HST pedal to forward or reverse and back to neutral to align the gears tooth to space. You are trying to turn a shaft only a few degrees, so slight pedal movement is all that is needed. It may take several iterations each shift until you get the feel for making it happen but you will feel the shift lever move into position as the gears align. Everything is still tight right now and takes a bit more effort than it will with more hours, but the gears must be aligned to make the shift. Under the right conditions, even with MANY hours on the tractor you may still need to use the same technique to shift ranges. Some see this as a "design flaw" or "safety issue" or .... and others accept it as part of operating a tractor instead of driving a Mercedes. I would tell you that 10 year old farm kids master this in two minutes but the safety police would swarm out of everywhere.

Hope this helps.

Agreed, my L5030 has just turned over the meter to 800 hours and I still have to do this and it makes no difference whether I use the clutch or not; rarely use the clutch anyway.

 

[yucholian]

It may be odd, but did it work? What did the dealer say? Is everything working okay now? Philip.

Philip, I did try it but did NOT work. In fact, I was not able to get it in LO at all before the dealer picked it up. FYI, clutch did not make any difference. I will update as I hear from the dealer. Thanks all.

 

[yucholian]

I got a call back from the dealer.
They agreed it's difficult to shift into LO.
They also said it gets easier as the tractor warms up, which I don't agree since I as having problems after 30 minutes of hauling heavy gravel.
They suggested that I let it warm up before trying to shift to Lo.
So I guess I have to wait over 30 minutes before I shift into Lo.
They also said to call back if it doesn't get better after 50 hours.
Hmmmm......

 

[SPYDERLK]

Gears are a combination of teeth and spaces. A transmission offers different ranges by connecting input shafts and output shafts through different size gears, which must run together, tooth of one gear in space of another. The shift requires meshing of two non-synchronized gears which will not always line up tooth to space. What you are experiencing is gear teeth to gear teeth and some rotation must take place to mesh. Neither moving the loader joystick nor "blurping" the throttle will cause this to happen.

Simultaneously attempt to make the shift by applying pressure in the required direction while very lightly rocking the HST pedal to forward or reverse and back to neutral to align the gears tooth to space. You are trying to turn a shaft only a few degrees, so slight pedal movement is all that is needed. It may take several iterations each shift until you get the feel for making it happen but you will feel the shift lever move into position as the gears align. Everything is still tight right now and takes a bit more effort than it will with more hours, but the gears must be aligned to make the shift. Under the right conditions, even with MANY hours on the tractor you may still need to use the same technique to shift ranges. Some see this as a "design flaw" or "safety issue" or .... and others accept it as part of operating a tractor instead of driving a Mercedes. I would tell you that 10 year old farm kids master this in two minutes but the safety police would swarm out of everywhere.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the responses.
It's a bit odd that the manual says the pedal has to be in neutral but also has you pushing forward/reverse to get the gears meshing.

Read the 1st quote. If it doesnt work by that description there must be something bad wrong.
larry