Thought I had a Lemon instead of an Orange

[RayinGA]

Well, "The Day" finally arrived, yesterday, along with my new L2600DT. After 4 weeks of indecision (L2600DT vs B2410 vs B2710, mo power vs mo features and money, etc), another couple listening to the dealer tell me the loader wasnt being mfg'd right now by Kubota and it would be another month or so, changeover to B2710, then week later, dealer calls, "No loader for several weeks,etc", back to L2600DT, wait decades, then the call finally comes. I'm sure all of you remember your "first" (tractor, that is), so you know how excited I was. got the obligatory quick half hour of instruction from the delivery guy. He pulls up the driveway, I'm on my own. Manuals read, pictures studied, implements spread all over the yard, printouts of posts from Tractorbynet.com papering yard, heart racing, I mount the big guy and go thru my "Starting Your New Kubota" checklist. PTO off, all gear and range levers in neutral, Stop Switch pushed in, diff lock off, Position Control down, etc. Hit the ignition, glow-plugged per specs, twisted to Start, and ta da!!...nothing. nada. Repeated same. RE-repeated. Again. Wife came down driveway from work, laughed, went inside. 45 minutes later, wife comes out, laughs, brings cold drink...I'm going over start procedure now several thousand times. Nada. Wife comes back out, supper's ready, get off tractor and let's eat... Dawn's on me that problem is electrical, something is not set to neutral, etc...finally notice the gear range lo-hi lever has very slight play in neutral position. Move it just a nanometer up, repeat Start Procedure 6,807th time, and "YEE HAW"!!!...she (he?) purrs to life. (wife sticks head out door, she's going to bed now, and I can sleep on Big Orange if I'd like). Anyway, an average day in the life of a New Tractor owner?...hope they get a little better. Know they will. Forgot to mention - thousands of neighbors come and go during this period, great excitement changing gradually to mild irritation, then noticeable disgust and finally incoherent mumbles.

RayinGA

 

[MChalkley]

Ray, the first day I used my L4310HST on a job site, there were a whole bunch of people around, and I got the range lever jammed in gear and couldn't get it out. (It turned out to be misadjusted a bit.) Anyway, I cut the tractor off with it in Medium range, then couldn't get it to Neutral to disable the safety switch, so I couldn't start it. After messing with it a while and drawing the obligatory crowd, I pressed one of them into service to hold the button on the switch down so I could get it started and move it enough to get the lever unjammed.

It happens to all of us from time to time. But it does generally get less frequent as your experience level goes up. Have fun!

Mark

 

[Billc]

Ray, congrats on your new toy...errr...I'm mean piece of work equipment!

The first time my wife got on mine we had one of our neighbors over. I had it in gear so it wouldn't start. When my wife complained that it wouldn't start, I told her she needed to rev up the starter. She said, "Rev up the starter???" I told her to grab hold of the hand throttle lever and move it back and forth really fast. Can't begin to tell you how hard this was to say with a straight face. So she does it and it still doesn't start. I make a comment about that's why men drive tractors. I told her that when she moves the hand throttle lever back and forth, she needs to do it a little faster. So she does. Yes, I know that her actions could have broken the throttle lever, but for the time my neighbor and I spent on our hands and knees laughing it would have been worth it.

 

[PaulB]

Ray - with me it was the 3 point. Nobody told me there is a knob under the seat that you turn to make the 3 point raise faster or slower. If you turn the knob all the way the 3 point won't budge at all. Sounds real simple now, but at the time I spent 2 hours and more cuss words than you could imagine figuring that one out! The "I told you you weren't a farmer mister big shot city boy who now that he is married to a horse person thinks he knows everything in the g-d damned world about farming and tractors and why don't you just go do surgery like I said you should and let me take care of the farm and pay somebody who really knows what the hell they are doing" looks from the wife were by far the worst part of the whole ordeal

 

[gordon]

My best or should I say my worst moment was my first fuel filter change on my old L3750. Still remember this like yesterday.
At the time I was working at a large marina on diesel engines and other service items, so this wasn't new to me a simple fuel filter change that is.
It's got a paper element not a spin on metal canister. Shut off the fuel supply at the tank and closed the valve on top of the filtr, removed the old one cleaned the housing filled as much fuel in the housing as possible. Then reinstalled the housing on the tractor. Tightened the ring opened the fuel supply valve to finish filling the filter housing. Now its full but I noticed that it seemed to be weeping at the ring so I shut the fuel supply at the tank back off again. Tightened the ring alittle more opened the valve on top of the filter and went in the cab to start the engine.---Guess what ran for a second and shut down.---Wife is watching and she knows my non verbals pretty well. Whats the matter mister diesel expert and so on. Shame of it was I didn't have an answer at the time. I fiddled with it started to get mad at it, so now it was time to do the walk away method. I went in the house fixed a cup of coffee and was thinking about what the problem was. No I couldn't be so dumb to leave the fuel valve off at the tank. Went back outside leaned up against the tractor and checked the valve----it was off-duh----looked around to see if the wife was looking, she wasn't. She walks up and says--so whats up with it--I forget my reply something like an airlock had to sit a minute and should be fine now. She gives me one of her huuummmmms. I vowed not to bleed this because before I started I was bragging how quick I could get this done to her. So I get on the tractor open throttle wide open and low and behold within a few attempts it started.
Everyone does some Lu-Lu moves, but the good thing is we learn from them and remember them even better./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

Just remember the walk away---or stop and think----then when you do figure it out give yourself a slap in the forehead and say----How could I be so dumb----works for me/w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

 

[MChalkley]

Bill, I can't believe you're still with us after that stunt, what with having married a redhead and all. All I can say is that it doesn't seem you got what you deserved, unless you're holding out on us. /w3tcompact/icons/wink.gif

Mark

 

[MChalkley]

PaulB, does the 3-point hitch rate control on your tractor control both raising and lowering speed? On the L-series tractors, it only controls lowering speed.

Mark

 

[gordon]

Mark try this go and turn your 3pt speed adjustment knob all the way clockwise and tell me what happens. On my L3750 it will stop all movement of the 3pt but its a much older tractor. On my 2350 it has the same effect stops all arm movement but that tractor is seven years old. Neither tractor is hst this may have something to do with it?
The knob only controls the lowering stroke on both tractors but turn it all the way clockwise and its shut off./w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif Gordon

 

[Bird]

On my B7100, you had to raise the seat, loosen a jam nut, then turn the bolt it was on, and re-tighten the jam nut to adjust the 3-point lowering speed (needless to say, it didn't get changed very often). That knob in front of and below the seat on the B2710, and others, is great. And on both of mine, it only controled the lowering speed. Gordon, I experimented early on by turning that sucker all the way clockwise, and like you said, it wouldn't lower at all, but it was already all the way up, so I haven't tried it at any other point to see if it would stop it from raising.

Bird

 

[PaulB]

Mark - tell you the truth I don't know if it affects lift rate or not. I have not touched mine since the aforementioned incident. Next time I run the tractor I have 2 jobs to do - see what the knob does, and see what happens when I run for 6 minutes by the clock at half rated rpm, and at full. I'll let you know.