Swapping & Borrowing Attachments - Hydraulic Fluid Issues...

[ALHILLDIRT]

The best way to end a good friendship is to loan any of your tools. As it was posted earlier, volunteer your time as well to do the work. Your friends are happy and if something breaks, you know who to blame.

 

[N80]

In the rural community where my property is, the farmers there almost have a co-op attitude to equipment. They do have stuff that is very strictly their own that doesn't get loaned about, but they also have a wide range of stuff that they all use when they need it including a boom truck, a spreader truck, a dump truck, a huge articulated loader, a backhoe, a no-till drill, etc etc. I hear some occasional grumbiling about who broke what and when, but it doesn't last long because each and every one of these units is so old and beat up it is more surprising when they work than when they don't.

I have been on the beneficiary end of some of this equipment and have reciprocated on occasion by lending my tractor to my farmer friend. So far, never had a problem other than it being covered with cow poop. When I went to get it one day his wife was washing it! I told her it was not necessary.

But yes, in general, I don't lend it to anyone else....of course, there is no one else within about 5 miles in any direction and I have no trailer....so that solves a lot of 'borrowing' issues.

 

[jake98]

I may be wrong, but, I don't see much marketing of tractor attachments for rent here in the northern reaches from nyc.
All the good attachments arent hyd anyway.
Dumping off ducts at the scrap thieves today I saw a beauty of a walk behind planter w/one broken off handle.

 

[jake98]

...da ****'s a ram?...

I see you have N80 saying ram too.. are you guys talking pistons?

 

[flusher]

...da ****'s a ram?...

I see you have N80 saying ram too.. are you guys talking pistons?

Slang for a hydraulic cylinder.

 

[skidoo]

I would think buying a used piece of equipment would apply as well. I am buying a used sickle mower from my dealer. So, if I had the dealer hook it up to one of his tractors for testing and verifying operation, should I consider that sufficiently flushed? Should I ask the dealer to specifically flush it before delivery?

 

[jake98]

Slang for a hydraulic cylinder.

Thanks Flusher,

I was starting to think everybody likes Dodges...
Jake Rama jama

 

[JerryK]

Big wrist pins and thick rods, too... I have a 2001 1/2 3/4ton Cummins HO 6speed 4X4....sitting in the barn waiting for summer diesel prices.... a dollar or more/gallon more expensive than gas now.

 

[Bill Barrett]

I only rarely use other hydraulic equipment with my tractor but I do sort of co-own a beat up (now defunct) pull type mower with a ram for raising and lowering it. Frankly, I just don't worry about trading fluid. That's what filters are for. I got more things to worry about than a little water or dust.

Me too if it was only hydraulics, but with HST in the same fluid, scares me.
That was one thing I missed when I bought my L3130. Next one will have two pumps/systems.

 

[flusher]

I would think buying a used piece of equipment would apply as well. I am buying a used sickle mower from my dealer. So, if I had the dealer hook it up to one of his tractors for testing and verifying operation, should I consider that sufficiently flushed? Should I ask the dealer to specifically flush it before delivery?

Probably.

But I would disconnect the quick disconnect fittings from the hose ends, disconnect the piston from the sicklebar lift linkage and work the piston by hand until all the old fluid is forced out of the cylinder.

If you want to be extra careful, disconnect the hoses from the cylinder, add new hydraulic fluid to the cylinder and repeatedly flush by working the piston by hand. That's what I did with my old Allis Chalmers 80T, but I was doing a pretty thorough refurbishment (including new hoses) so I had a lot of the stuff disconnected already.

Reassemble, attach the hoses to the tractors, run the sicklebar ram using your tractor remotes and then top off the hydraulic fluid in your tractor.

 

[rankrank1]

For Hydraulic cylinders:
Back in the day my grandfather, uncle, and my dad had multiple tractors of all differnt brands and vintages so the hydraulic sytems were different in some instances as were the fluids (e.g. high volume/low pressure and low volume/high pressure etc.). We simply kept a dedicated hydraulic cylinder assigned to each tractor - if the tractor was switched to a different implement the cylinder moved with it. Hoses were always made sufficiently long to work on any implement that that tractor might be hooked up to. (If you were loaning an implement to someone else - make them use their own cylinder from their tractor). Doing this not only prevented oil cross contamination, but eliminated potential hyraulic cylinder damage too as each cylinder was taylored to each tractors system design.

Now for hyrdaulic driven equipment: We never had any thing like this (or rented any), so I see your concern. If I ever encountered this scenario, I would at least try to flush the majority of the fluid out if I could somehow do it relatively easily.