Increasing PT1850 FEL Tilt Range

[SpringHollow]

I have never been happy with the tilt range on my PT's FEL. It may be only an issue with my bucket since it is a Lackender bucket, not a PT bucket. My original tilt range was 90ｰ which let me either carry things well or dump well but not both. So I made bolt-on adapter plates to extend the connection point for the top link. They work pretty well, increasing the tilt range to 115ｰ (I made it adjustable so I could get a greater tilt range if I so desired but it will create some issues with certain geometries

I knew the modification would weaken the curling force and it did. I corrected for this by increasing the tilt hydraulic cylinder diameter from 2" to 2 1/2" since I had one on hand. Realize that increasing the cylinder diameter might lead to premature failure of the FEL, especially the pivot for the top link/cylinder arm.



For those interested, a more detailed description can be found at Increasing FEL Tilt Range – Spring Hollow
I am switching over to a new web site and this is the first page. The homepage includes a link to the old site which is still active. If you run into issues with the site, just let me know.

 

[SpringHollow]

Here it is in action:

 

[cqaigy2]

Looks like a good range of motion. :thumbsup:

 

[MossRoad]

Nice!

So basically you increased the length of the rollover lever on the top side?

 

[BobRip]

Nice!

So basically you increased the length of the rollover lever on the top side?

I like the way you increased the cylinder diameter to compensate for more travel. Very thorough job. Do you have any issue with slower curl speed?

 

[SpringHollow]

Yes, I just increased the length of the top side. That made more sense than shortening the bottom side especially since it is all bolt on so it can easily be removed.

No, the curl speed is fine. But then I am tempted to adjust the needle valves on my cylinders to slow down the speed in order to have better control when using pallet forks etc.

Do you guys have any troubles with the tilt range? Since I prefer the swinging mini hoe, I have not used my grapple bucket in years so I can not remember if it had issues.

Ken

 

[SpringHollow]

BTW, you definitely need an adjustable top link if doing this in order to find the sweet spot or mock one up until you find the length you want and then make a fixed one.

Ken

 

[MossRoad]

.....
Do you guys have any troubles with the tilt range? ....

My 425 has a strange dump/curl range. When the FEL arms are down, it only dumps a little before hitting the stops. As I rais the FEL arms, the bucket dump angle keeps increasing. By the time the FEL arms are all the way up, I have very steep dump angle. I guess it makes some sense, in that you want to have the most dump angle when dumping at full FEL height and you don't need to dump that much when the FEL arms are down.

It is one of the drawbacks of their FEL design. It's also not conducive to modification for self-leveling bucket VS a parallelogram design.

On the other hand, it's simple simple simple and sometimes that's 90% of what I want.

 

[SpringHollow]

Things like that are what I meant by the geometry changes significantly (based on loader arm height).

I could lift the bucket all of the way and then dump but it would always leave some in the bucket so I used to bang the tilt or lift to try to get it out - not good for the machine.

 

[MossRoad]

Things like that are what I meant by the geometry changes significantly (based on loader arm height).

I could lift the bucket all of the way and then dump but it would always leave some in the bucket so I used to bang the tilt or lift to try to get it out - not good for the machine.

Now I gotta go out and put my bucket on and see exactly what's what! :laughing: