Fluid spew on bat wing fold

[KnuckleDragger]

I am considering a purchase of a Ford 7710 and 15' Bush Hog from a neighbor. He is offering a good and fair price. The 7710 ran great, but I have concerns about the hydraulics on the Bush Hog. He let me mow with them this weekend. During fold-up, each side would walk up a little at a time. Each and every time, the right side would fold completely first, followed by the left. When the left side finished, a fairly decent amount of fluid would spew out (think Don Simmons in the dugout) from some point on/near the cylinder. On fold-out, the left side would always "catch" and would require a gentle nudge to get it started. The hinge was pretty rusty/sticky, but I would think the system could get it over the hump. Additionally, the *right* side unfolds when the system is at rest. Do you think I may face a costly repair, or something as simple as a hose replacement?

 

[aczlan]

Sounds like a bad hose on the L side and possibly a cylinder that is leaking internally on the R side.
I would get it and replace the hose, then see what the other side does.
If it is plumbed like our tedder, it is normal for one side to drop first as the cylinders are "teeed" together and if one gets started a little before the other, it will push the other cylinder up as it goes down.

Repair prices, I would guess $150-$200 to have the cylinder rebuilt and another $50-$100 for a new hose.

Aaron Z

 

[McCaskey]

That's normal leakage for a Bush Hog bat wing. My TD1500 does the same thing. It's a over pressure relief valve at the bottom of one cylinder when all wings are lifted and pressure is still applied. After the wings are up & locked, relive any line pressure with the tractor control valve.

If a wing is unfolding while sleeping, the mechanical latch is not hooking.

7710 is a good worker. I have a 6610 & 7700 with very few repairs.

 

[Soundguy]

hey.. have you been in my yard playing with my NH 7610s and JD 1517 batwing?

sounds 10000% normal to me.

those SA cyls will blow a lil oil out, as some makes it past the packing into the open 'vented' side and it will blow past the wire or vent if it has one.

since you have 2 wings on one circuit, the hyds will take the path of least resistance.. thus the wings will fold a bit unevenly.. whichever one will move the easiest moves till the other one gets easier.. eventually one will fold all the way up, forcing the other to move all the way up. most all of them will leak a bit thru the cyls at rest, so that's why most of them have transport locks. my jd 1517 has 2 bars that swing out and you pin them to hold the wings.. and the lift cyl has a flip up piece of angle that lays on the piston and against the deck lift cyl to lock it into place.

if it has been mor ethan a week since mowing, one of my wings sometimes catches about 1/4 way down.. I just jump off and grab an edge and give a tug and it drops. that hinge has been welded on and may not be 100% true.. but it folds and unfolds fine once you help it once in the morning...

sounds like you were out mowing with my equipment..

soundguy

 

[jlsmith]

Sounds like my mower. Its common for one to fall or lift before the other. As far as the leakage it sounds like a blown seal in the cylinder. verry easy to fix. the fluid should be coming from the vent plug on the bottom end of the cylinder, you could either fix it or just live with it but always make shure your locks are in place when lifted and be careful when you unlock them wing could fall. One of mine fell yesterday after my cylinder pin came out. LUCKLY onone got hurt.

 

[KnuckleDragger]

Thanks for the replies. I wont concern myself with the spewing fluid and sticky release on the one side. And after reading that fine tutorial on hydraulics that someone posted, I now understand how one side is drooping when the system is at rest--it is designed to do that!! The other side would droop to if it weren't mechanically stuck.

I do have one more question about this, but it isn't necessarily about the same problem. There seems to be a fair amount of fluid on the barn floor behind the mower after setting since Sunday. It is hard to guess how much because it soaked right into pea gravel, but I'd say it is between a pint and quart. I am fairly certain that it is not gearbox oil. Could it just be the excess blow off from the relief valve finally making its way off the body? I did have to raise the wings ALOT to go thru various gates and to get out of the unbelievable places between trees that I got myself into. If not from the spew, are hydraulic leaks normal in a healthy system?

 

[KnuckleDragger]

.I now understand how one side is drooping when the system is at rest--it is designed to do that!! The other side would droop to if it weren't mechanically stuck.

Scratch that. That can't be right. Time to go back to the tutorial. (Its amazing to me the random thoughts and ideas that are bouncing around in my head when I roll out of bed in the morning).

 

[Soundguy]

it's drooping due to fluid leaks. either at a cyl packing or a valve.. or a fitting.

I also doubt there is any relief valve back there...

soundguy

 

[KnuckleDragger]

Thanks all for the feedback. I'll go with the cylindar packing line of thinking. Yesterday, I mowed a 40 acre field in one shot--no raising/lowering outside of the of the initial transport. I really like this tractor and mower. When I finished, I was raising the wings, and a tremendous fountain of fluid jettisoned from the vent plug. That was pretty much all Scotty could give it, and my day was officially done. There was a slight flow from the plug after I parked it and cleaned things up.

What damage can be done to components of a hydraulic system if one attempts to operate it when a significant fluid void or pressure leak exists? The holes for the locking pin didn't line up well on one side, and I tried to get it to budge with the valve. No joy. I just parked it in a clear spot in the barnyard so the wing could droop safely down.

 

[Soundguy]

what's happening is fluid is bypassing the packing and getting on the vent side of the cyl.. when you exercise the cyl, the fluid trapped there gets expelled.

repacking the cyl will likely fix it.

in the case of the holse not lining up.. many people weld some chain with hooks to them so they can transport lock the wings ..

soundguy

 

[dawoodwa]

My Rhino mower does the same thing, rings leak by on the cylinder. I have repacked one of them but the other is doing it now, the mower is about 12 years old. My biggest problem has been the hinges, I wound up cutting both of them off and rewelding them. It appeared that the alignment was wrong when I bought it.

 

[MKL1980]

Most of time the spew issue could be fixed real simple, by replacing the breather on the cyc. I fixed many by doing this. An any way worst case is would have to re-ring the cyc. Most times you could get a rebuild kit fir around 60.00 bucks on most shredder cyc.

 

[Soundguy]

heck.. new cyls like a red lion are usually only a hundred..

soundguy

 

[banjodunn]

G'day as soundguy said new cyl's are cheap and do away with any of the prob of having a bad bore or rod damaging new seals may not be that dear to convert to d/a and do away with having to get off the tractor to lower that sticky wing



Jon