John Deere 42 Kicker

[johnwilsonosf]

Greetings all,
I am hoping that you might be able to assist me with a problem I am having. my John Deere 42 Kicker (on a JD 348 baler) is not resetting the pan after a kick. The Hydraulic cylinder does not return. Here is what I have seen. After removing the kicker cylinder, I found a piece of brass (5/8 inch long by 3/16 thick) inside the hose going from the control unit to the cylinder. I then drained the entire kicker reservoir, and removed lots of pieces of brass. Trying to find where they came from, I have taken apart the control unit that is mounted on the kicker. There is no foreign objects inside of the control unit, so the only place that I can think of the brass coming from is the actual pump that is run off of the main flywheel. That is my next job.
In the mean time, has anyone ever experienced this problem. Our old 336 baler with a kicker had this problem, and we solved it by adding a squirt of grease to the the spring inside the control unit where the distance control wheel is. This has not helped with the problem this time. I am wondering if maybe because of the brass pieces (see picture), I am not getting enough pressure from the pump to kick the bale/return the pan after each kick. Could the brass pieces be part of the pump assembly? Or is the broken brass a red herring, and I am barking up the wrong tree. Any insight would be greatly appreciated. I initially asked this question in the JD forum, and you can see the discussion at this link.
John Deere 42 Kicker Hydraulics - TractorByNet.com

Thank you for your help.

John

 

[JasG]

Did you take the cylinder apart? Probably brass is inside of that if it was in the hose that feeds it. There is also a huge spring at the bottom of the cylinder that acts as a cushion but also helps with the return. That could be broken so the cylinder is slamming open and not getting the pull back to the bottom.

The brass possibly did come from the pump. I know depending on year the kickers used different pumps so it's hard to say. But if you had the control unit apart, that is the only place left to look.

I know these parts aren't cheap. We just spend $600 on the cylinder, spring, and the hose that goes from the control to the cylinder on a 30 kicker.