Grillo G85 tiller oil change

[texanjim]

Hi All,

Finally got round to doing a winter service on the Grillo, but have a question about changing the oil in the tiller gearbox.

I think I can see the oil drain plug at the back of the tiller gearbox (Part no. 50014 on the PDF I have).

What is the procedure for draining and refilling the tiller. I'm assuming, remove from main tractor unit, remove plug and tip tiller upright (with PTO pointing vertical) to drain.

Then to refill, I guess I use the same hole? The PDF manual I have says to fill it to nearly full. What angle is it best to have the tiller in order to refill? The hole isn't in an obvious place for refilling.

Trial and error, along with spilled oil will no doubt answer my question, but thought I'd see if anyone could point me in the right direction.

Many thanks for any info you can provide.

 

[TnAndy]

Tell ya one thing about it if it's a diesel.....absolutely positively do not overfill it. AND check the oil in the springtime BEFORE you start it.

Changed oil in mine before putting it up for the winter and did not check it before starting in the spring, and got a "run-away" diesel out of it. Never that happen on a diesel before, and had no idea what was causing it or that a diesel could go to some unGodly amount of RPM....sounded like a chainsaw revved wide open !

What I suspect happens is over the winter diesel fuel slipped by the injector pump ( located low on the engine ) and overfilled the crankcase.....and once the engine warmed up a few minutes, the extra crankcase oil/fuel mix was sliding past the rings and feeding LOTS of fuel to the upper cylinder area to burn.....and it was OFF TO THE RACES !

 

[texanjim]

Thanks TnAndy, I've read on the Earthtools web site that overfilling the diesel engines is a bad idea. Mine's a petrol Honda though so no problems there.

It's actually the tiller implement gearbox itself I'm interested in, as I've no idea when the oil in there was last changed. I can see an oil stain from one side of the box where roots etc have wrapped around the shaft, so expect it needs a top up at the very least.

 

[texanjim]

All serviced and ready to go now. Oil in tiller was thick, black and smelled very burned. There wasn't a lot in there either!

Had to use a 500ml oil can to pump about 250ml of oil into the gearbox, as the drain hole is to small to pour into.

Will have to keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn't leak to much, and top up when needed.

 

[Bentleg]

What weight oil did you use?

 

[texanjim]

It was 80w90, the same as I used in the tractor gearbox.

 

[farmerboybill]

Huh, I thought I had replied to this one. Must not have hit send. Glad to see you worked it out on your own, anyway.

 

[texanjim]

Thanks farmerboybill. No worries, wasn't that difficult to figure out in the end.