Renze,
I agree with you about the hydraulic pumps, but have another mental block there as well. One pump was tested out and was very strong. No problems with it at all. The other one wasn't. I pulled it out and had it and the drive motor rebuilt for $3,000. Now it's just like new. They are Sundstrand pumps, which to my limited knowledge, is a decent name brand. They are also the same pumps used in the John Deere 850 dozers if that helps any.
It could be them, but everytime I have a problem the mechanics at Case blame the pumps, and after awhile it turns out to be something else. The last time was the loss of power to all the pumps, includeing the blade. They said I had to replace all three as they ALL went bad at the same time. I forced the issue as being kind of hard to believe, and had them do a test. That's when we found out the pumps were in fact fine with plenty of preasure. For whatever reason, the problem slowly corrected itself and I had full power to the hyrdraulics again. The only thing that makes sense to me from reading the manuals is that the anti-stall control was stuck. It would cause the problems I had, but nobody checked it when I had it at Case.
Anyway, two things came up last week. My parents are here to help for awhile and while running the dozer, my Dad noticed that we had exhaust coming out of the front grill. Not just dust!! This got us to looking at the muffler, which is shot, but too expensive to replace. Case wants $800 for a new one, but said we might be able to find one for $650 if we look around. Either way, that's not gonna happen.
When I did the engine rebuild, there was a small hole in the bottom of the muffler that I thought I'd sealed up with a bolt and fender washers. It didn't work and the hole has gotten allot bigger. Also the pipe coming off the muffler and into the tail pipe is rusted off. I did a bad patch job that didn't hold up either.
Dad thought we should try to get it welded up right with a welder, but none of the ones we talked to wanted to bother with it, or they wanted almost as much as a new one would cost. Then we got lucky and found a muffler shop in a small town about ten miles from Tyler that did it for $65.
Now the hot exhaust is going out the tail pipe and not through the radiator. This should help.
The other issue was cleaning the radiator. I've been running a hose through it for a month now trying to get it clean. The bottom part has been plugged for a very long time and it just wasn't coming out. I figured that it had been that way before the engine rebuild without over heating, then it probably wasn't the problem. Dad dissagreed.
He reminded me that we never ran the dozer during the heat of summer and that the new engine was putting out allot more power. The more power is allowing us to move more dirt, dig deaper and push it harder, so this is also causing the additional temps to the hydraulics.
He went and talked to a guy at the radiator shop who did a good job for me on the dumptruck radiator. He told my dad that it was OK to preasure was a steel radiator. Not aluminum or copper. Turns out the dozer has a steel radiator. We rented a preasure washer and was able to finally get it clean.
We've ran it the last couple days without any overheating, even though it's been over 100 degrees out with high humidity.
Maybe it's fixed???
Meadowlark,
Thank you, that was very kind of you and much appreciated.
Eddie
