JD 4X10 SERIES ELECTRONICS

[Anonymous Poster]

I've seen a few discussions here about the durability of the switches and electronics on the new JD 4x10 series so I thought that someone might be interested in my experiences.

Maybe about two weeks after I got my 4310 I had just finished washing it and was putting it in the garage when it just stopped moving. Like it went into neutral. The engine never missed a beat but the wheels weren't going around. I have the power reverser transmission. When it stopped I tried reverse and it worked but a second later it quit working in reverse also. It would not move in any range, gear, or direction. I left it sit and went in the house to mull the problem over for a while. Maybe ten minutes later I went back out and everything was back to normal. I thought that maybe I got some water into the fuse block because I had spent a little time washing the floor and dash area. I don't have a pressure washer, I just used the hose. I figured that a tractor should be designed to get wet occasionally. After that I tried to keep water away from the fuse panel area. I never had another problem for about 200 hours until last weekend. I drove the tractor to a friend's house about a mile from me to grade his lawn. On the way home I got caught in a downpour. I have a canopy so it wasn't real bad for me but apparently the canopy didn't protect the tractor. It stopped again, right in the middle of the road. Would not move in either direction. I did notice that when that happened the switch that stops the engine when you leave the seat did not function. Apparently whatever got wet and shorted was telling the tractor that it was in neutral, no matter what gear it was in. I walked to the house and got a chain and called my friend to come over and tow the tractor out of the road. By the time I got back it was working again.

There is no end to the story yet because I haven't been able to get it to the dealer to have it checked. I did ask the service manager if he had ever heard of this before and he said that it was new to him. When I get this fixed I will let everyone know what it was. If anyone has had this problem I would be interested to hear about it. This has only happened twice in 230 hours so I'm thinking that I'll be lucky if the dealer can duplicate the problem.

I'm thinking that water must be getting into one of the switches on the fender because the fuse panel is relatively protected by the canopy. Then again there may be a switch under the tractor that is causing the problem.

Other than that I don't have any complaints about this machine. Anyone else had this problem?

Bob

 

[rockyridgefarm]

Well, I don't know but over 200 hrs on a tractor (and two horses) on 1+ acre. Whew!

 

[Bob_S]

Interesting problem. All electronics will misbehave when getting wet providing there is enough minerals in the water. It is very possable that water is getting past a seal (providing there are proper seals). I would be most suspicious of water that might reach one the right fender control switches (where the wires connect) or in the forward / reverse pedal sensor box. You could experiment by pouring some tap water in select areas of the tractor doing one area at a time. If the test area doesn't cause the problem right away, flush out the area with distilled water and allow it to compleatly dry before moving on to the next area. If you can cause the fault, inspect the area for design or manufacturing problems. You want to again flush the area out with distelled water when your all done. This is a fixable problem but you may have to do the research and repair yourself. Good luck and keep us informed. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif