How are the hydro drive tractors doing in the bitter cold ?

[MossRoad]

And...

"Now, I had heard that word at least ten times a day from my old man. He worked in profanity the way other artists might work in oils or clay. It was his true medium; a master. But, I chickened out and said the first name that came to mind. Schwartz! "

 

[MossRoad]

And...

"Fra-gee-lay. That must be Italian."

 

[lawn_king]

7 seasons of snow work here with kubota hydros, never a problem. Some storms were so cold we ran the tractor 30 + hours without shutting it off, for fear she wouldn't start again. Same with the trucks, whenever you stop, there ia always that chance that you will not start!

 

[Soundguy]

Yikes.. no hyds bypass! I'm so used to heavy equipment with hyds bypasses than i hadn't thought about some equipment not having it.

Soundguy

Our little Power Trac with the Kohler 25HP gas engine starts just fine at -5 with a good battery. It has 3 hydraulic pumps connected directly to the engine and no bybass valve, so the starter has to turn the engine plus the thick hydraulic fluid on start up. You can really tell the difference in the force that it takes that starter to turn the juice when the temps drop. But it does fine. We let it run at 1/3 throttle for about 10 minutes while I hand shovel the walks and porch steps and brush off the car. That's enough to get the hydraulics warmed up. Then I cycle the FEL full up and down a few times as well as angle the plow back and forth a few times. The first one or two times the things move slowly, but then on the third of fourth stroke, you can see the speed pick up rapidly as the warm fluid makes it out of the reservoir and into the cylinders. Then it's off to the races plowing snow.

 

[john_bud]

No No John; It's the pump handle!

Cool, I have one of those --- gotta go check it out!

jb

 

[MossRoad]

Yikes.. no hyds bypass! I'm so used to heavy equipment with hyds bypasses than i hadn't thought about some equipment not having it.

Soundguy

Yes, it kind of amazed me, too. My old IH had a dump pedal under my left heel. If the engine was hard starting, just hold that thing down and it would spin like a pinwheel in a summer breeze!

It was also handy if the tractor had to be towed a few feet. However, towing that hydro unit required special care and any distance over a few feet required much prep, hydraulic fliud, buckets and a valve opened with a wrench. At least the little PT425 only requires a bypass valve on the side of the tram pump to be opened with a wrench for towing.

That is one advantage a gear tractor has over a hydro unit... just push in the clutch and you are towable without fear of damaging anything.

 

[art]

Wow! That little petal went away in the early 70's for the hydro relief!

 

[schmism]

mines doing great. had it out this weekend in the balmy 40 deg weather. did great.

the coldest ive had mine out was 8 above. whinned just about the entire time i had it on (about an hr) and the colant temp bairly got above the first tick on the gauge, but no issues to speak of.....

 

[chrisjbell]

Well, I'm just glad that it has started raining here - we had a really cold, dry January. Now it is back to nice warm temps...today was beautiful.

But my HST was just fine during the cold.

 

[_RaT_]

Well, I'm just glad that it has started raining here - we had a really cold, dry January. Now it is back to nice warm temps...today was beautiful.

But my HST was just fine during the cold.

Wow, your alive Chris....

 

[botaman2]

You are doing your HST a disservice by locking out the clutch! It is far more beneficial to let the HST warm up with the clutch out,so that the fluid can get pumped around thus warming itself. I generally even keep the mid-pto engaged (being located at the bottom of the tranny)to further the warmup.

 

[john_bud]

You are doing your HST a disservice by locking out the clutch! It is far more beneficial to let the HST warm up with the clutch out,so that the fluid can get pumped around thus warming itself. I generally even keep the mid-pto engaged (being located at the bottom of the tranny)to further the warmup.

My experience is from operations at temperatures from -30F to -15F. I've gone out of my way to discuss this with service managers from Kubota, JD and NH. All of them agree that it shouldn't happen, but all have seen it happen (HST filter leaks). They all agree that the best way to warm up an HST tractor at the temperatures I listed is the way I outlined on 2/08.

Shock loading of the filter housing to trans seal from the pre-charge pump causes the seal to blow and the fluid to leak past the seal. It occurs due to the overpressure relief valve not being able to open instantaneously and the fluid flow rate across the relief being much smaller than the pump output when the fluid temperatures have thickened it dramatically.

That's my direct experience, your's may vary.

 

[pat32rf]

My JD4300 came with the optional trans heater. Only problem was the fact that it was mounted in the drain plug-the lowest part of the casing and had a 8" cord hanging down. Cord lasted about one week and the heater came out the first fluid change. I now have a block heater, lower rad hose heater and a battery heater, all fed off one cord, controlled by a switch at the front door. At -30C I give it about 1hr then let it run for5-10 minutes before working it. Most times I am only running up to the barn for a bucket of firewood or similar so it gets a short run at 1500rpm before it needs full rpm.
There is a spot on the range shifter where the tranny is in neutral if I ever have to move it with a dead engine.(I found this out once by knocking the shift lever just before going down a hill)