Oil & Fuel Heat gage for B7100

[keo216]

I have a 1996 Kubota B7100 HST. And we know they have no heat gage. Kubota installed a whistle on the end of the overflow tube to sound an alarm when it's too hot. Naturally you can't hear the whistle over the engine noise. I lengthened the tube to be closer to me but now when it's hot or for no reason at all it will blow hot antifreeze on my ankle. I'm getting a little sick of this. And would like to know when it's heating up, not when it's too hot.
Does anyone know how to install a heat gage on a B7100??
And I wish I knew how to keep my radiator from plugging up with dust and rag weed pollen so quickly.

 

[bdhsfz6]

I had an earlier version of the B7100 HST purchased back in 1989. Yours is the newer release of the same tractor and may be somewhat different.

Whenever my machine would run hot or overheat, it was usually caused by a plugged up radiator screen. I began cleaning it every other day or so when doing brush work during hot weather. Blowing out the radiator core with compressed air every so often helped also. Have you checked your radiator for sludge buildup? That happened to me a couple of times in the 18 years I owned the tractor. Running a higher antifreeze / water ratio will help dissipate the heat a bit better.

When doing brush hogging in the fall, I put one of those universal elastic automobile bug screens over the front cowling. It looked goofy but worked well and was easy to clean in the field.

I haven't seen a temperature gauge for a B7100. I just kept the radiator clean as mentioned above and avoided the overheating issue. There must be a universal type gauge out there that would work. Maybe another poster will offer a solution.

 

[bdhsfz6]

Wrong! It will raise your boiling point a little, but it will not do a better job of cooling.

Thanks for the correction. For some reason, I had fewer boil overs with my B7100 using pure antifreeze. Maybe it was due to the higher boiling point.

 

[Baby Grand]

Does this tractor have the old thermo-siphon cooling system, or does it have a pump?
Maybe install a thermocouple in the top radiator tube - I've been thinking about doing the same with our old B5100.

 

[keo216]

It's the old thermo-siphon.
I'm going to flush and clean the system but would still like to have a heat gage so I could tell if the temp had started to climb. Sometimes the radiator screen starts to build up chaff and you don't know it till it blows antifreeze oh your ankle.

 

[Egon]

A temporary solution may be a gun type temperature, heat sensor gun.

 

[keo216]

Thanks for reply. I love the tractor. The big problem is the radiator. It plugs so easily with dust and ragweed pollen. I have to carry two tanks of air to blow the radiator out every hour. It gets to be a pain. Compounded by not knowing what's going cooling wise. If I had a heat gage I would know when it was starts to overheat. I rerouted the whistle tube to be closer to me but think I have the whistle too high. It never whistles now, just blows hot water on me.

 

[Egon]

Wrap window screen around the front of the tractor. Take it off and shhake out to clean.

 

[ericm979]

My B7100 had a Kubota radiator screen that was a large box extending out the grill. Gives it a larger surface area so it takes longer to clog.

The one time it went off I had no problem hearing the whistle even though I was running a chipper and had hearing protecters on.