Pat's Easy Change For those who use Pat's Easy Change System (PECS)

Ron JD670 · Apr 5, 2012

Greg, gwdixon, The It, and others

Thank you for the feed back and advise.

greg_g said:
First, you're not likely going to find a Cat1 toplink that will adjust out that long. Safely anyway. They're usually marketed by the length between the two swivel eyes when they're adjusted to the shortest length. So going by marketed length, the longest generic Cat1 I've ever seen was a 20 incher. That means you'd be lucky to get 32 operationally safe inches out of it. Longer than that and you'd have to buy a tractor-specific toplink, and they're comparatively quite expensive.

Sounds to me though, that you're trying to use your boxblade like a pond scoop.Toplinks extended to such extreme lengths are just screamin' to get bent (or fall apart like you experienced). Instead of investing in another toplink search, have you considered buying/borrowing/renting a pond scoop for that particular application?

//greg//

I was able to find a 20" body top link at the local Mahindra dealer. On my JD the red Top link makes it look like I'm decorating a Christmas tree. I miss typed before thinking I needed 36 inches. At 32 inches, which is pretty much what I need, both ends have full bite ( 2") on the body. When the standard one separated I had leveled the BB without paying attention to the TL length tuns out I only had one full thread bite.

The road drainage ditch I was cleaning, after a rain, had wet clay mixed with gravel and wet grass. When I lifted the BB the clay would not fall out. I moved to the area off the road and used a hoe to push the clay out of the box. The one thread could not take the load. No real damage to the link, I cleaned it up the thread with a file. I feel lucky I found it without creating a mess or a bigger problem.

gwdixon said:
RonJD670:
You've run into one of the weaknesses of the PEC. The additional 4", or so, added on to the length of the lower arms puts the top link out of whack (too short)......
The top link can be cut apart with a pipe cutter and a 4" - 6" piece of round tube welded in. A welding shop can do this for you if you don't weld. The longer insert will give the top length threads more bite.

To alleviate greg_g's concern you could buy a Cat 2 top link and do the same thing. A couple of Cat 2 to Cat 1 bushings could be tacked in to make useable for Cat 1. However, I don't think it is necessary - the extended Cat 1 that I lengthened has held up quite well.

gwdixon
I'm looking for a piece of pipe to modify my shorter second HF top link as you suggested, just in case this longer one I found locally folds up on me when I try the bush hog. Not to concerned with the BB as I'm not to aggressive with it. Could not find a longer cat 2 in stock. To impatient to wait after I found the longer cat 1. I hope I don't regret it.