I had my hydraulic toplink cylinder off a while back when using my post hole auger. When I put it back on I wasn't paying attention and installed the cylinder with it's fittings and hoses on the same side as the rear remote quick disconnects. It worked fine but I failed to notice that installing it that way allowed the forward most hose to chaff against the quick disconnect under certain conditions. This weekend that hose sprung a leak due to that chaffing and I had to scramble to get a replacement. First thing learned: Always put the top link on with hose fittings on the opposite side of the quick disconnects.
It sprung a leak at some point on Saturday while I was mowing a 20 acre chunk of land for a guy who lives about 15 miles away from my home. I was almost done mowing when I noticed it. I left the tractor parked in the field as I had the new hose made. I didn't know how long it had been leaking or much hydraulic fluid had leaked out. I looked at the sight glass and it looked like it was low. So this morning I had brought over a gallon of tractor fluid to put in it when I put on the new hose. The access to the fill port is easier to access with the three point lifted. so I raised the bush hog all the way up. I put the gallon in and didn't see any change on the sight glass. Then I remembered the thread on this forum about the sight glass appearing to be empty when it is really over full. I looked closely and realized the tractor was parked slightly uphill. So I realized that it might indeed be over-full. I was unsure what would happen if you operated the unit with too much hydraulic fluid. But pulling the drain plug drain to drain some of the fluid out in the middle of a field sounded kind of risky. And what happens if it was not really over full but in fact really really low? Running too low sounds riskier that running over full. Everything seemed to be working fine when I shut the tractor down, ,, but it might indeed be low. Is running it over-full a major problem?? What to do?? To check things out properly I felt that I needed to trailer the tractor back to my shop. It was 15 miles to home most of which is down a nasty bumpy gravel road at 10 mph. After much contemplation I reluctantly decided to just try to finish the little bit of mowing I had left to do with the tractor as is.
I started up the tractor and went to lower the three point to mow, but it wouldn't lower!
Now I was unsure if it was overfilled or if it was empty , or if I had broke something. I nervously loaded up the tractor and took it home (took close to an hour). On the way home I realized I could drain the fluid back out by disconnecting the hose at the top link cylinder and just operating the lever to take out exactly one gallon, and I could have done that in the field. But I was almost home when I thought of that. At home I managed to pump that gallon back out using that method. After which, the top of fluid showed up in the sight glass, and low and behold, everything worked again just fine! But my lack of attention sure cost me a lot of time!
So the other things I learned: 1) The sight glass for the hydraulics is easy to miss-read. 2) Be sure the tractor is setting level when you check the fluid, and 3) If your three point goes up but not down, you probably have too much fluid in the system. With hind sight, I could have finished mowing with the leaky hose as it only leaked when I pushed the rear remote lever, and I don't really need to adjust the top link for mowing. Funny how you get smart too late.
Hopefully someone else can learn from my misadventures.
