Why 5W30?

[woodlandfarms]

Peter, how often are you changing your hyd oil (at that price, I hope not often).

For me my PT tends to blow the occassional hose and I say I run through a case of 10-40 Chevron costco cheapo a year. I mulled over putting fancy stuff in (I have fancy stuff in the engine) but didn't feel the benefits in the hydraulics outweighed the cost.

 

[J_J]

Was wondering why Power Trac uses 5W30 motor oil in the hydraulics. Why wouldn't you use hydraulic fluid for hydraulic pumps, motors etc... Wouldn't the Robin engine start easier in cold weather with a load using hydraulic fluid vs motor oil.

Thanks
Frank

Simple reason is that it works well and has been working well for about 20 years.

Is there any better oil for your climate, maybe if you tested them all.

Just about any mineral based oil will work including some synthetics fluids. Just have to find a fluid you like. Price also makes a big difference.

My hyd tank holds about 20 GPM of 10W-40 motor oil, so changing out that much fluid from a $4 a qt to $10 a QT could get expensive.

 

[ponytug]

Carl,

It was the first time in six years. I hope that this fill will last at least six years. I would have done it sooner, but I was fence sitting on the regular vs. synthetic oil. Part of the impetus was that I cross threaded the filler cap for the tank at around 300 hours and I didn't discover it until after power washing the tractor. While I couldn't ever see anything in the oil, I was concerned about what might be in there. (Apparently nothing)

With various "issues" that the tractor has had I probably put in three gallons of top up oil over six years, of which two gallons were a single incident (motor seal blow out) in the first six hours of tractor use. I have the vent from the automatic brake circuit routed back to the tank. It used to leak a small amount every brake cycle. PT has a fix for it, supposedly on all of the newer machines.

I do install the oil filter fully filled, so I have probably added 2-3 gallons (12 filter changes) worth of oil there. I also have half a dozen high strength magnets on the oil filter to trap any metal debris going through the filter. After I change the oil, I move the magnets to the new filter.

So far, I haven't blown any hoses, though I have had more than a few start weeping.

All the best,

Peter

Peter, how often are you changing your hyd oil (at that price, I hope not often).

For me my PT tends to blow the occassional hose and I say I run through a case of 10-40 Chevron costco cheapo a year. I mulled over putting fancy stuff in (I have fancy stuff in the engine) but didn't feel the benefits in the hydraulics outweighed the cost.

 

[woodlandfarms]

So you change your large filter every 6 months? How many hours are you putting on it? I do once a year and am probably 100 to 150 hours a year max.

You should see Ken Simolo's magnet setup. He sent me one that I have yet to install (don't want to take the tank apart quite yet). When I do I am going totry and figure out a tank temp guage and oil level sight.

 

[ponytug]

Dear Carl,

I'm a slave to the recommend service intervals, such as they are. I change it every 50 hours, so yes, about twice a year.

I love Ken's magnet setup. Since it works on the full flow, I think that it is way better than mine, but it hasn't made it to the top of my do list, yet. I keep thinking that I ought to put a full flow filter on the PTO return to tank line to do a full filter on the oil, when it isn't being used by the PTO, or perhaps on the PTO line with a cross connector when not using the PTO line. Still in the concept stage....

All the best,

Peter

 

[woodlandfarms]

Keep me in the loop on your concept. My PT has two Hyd filters The big boy that runs the tram (OK, this is a mystery to me as the tram is a closed loop system, right? so not a lot of oil flowing?) I guess I am wrong on that as it has the 1" Hydro lines coming and going.... Probably pulling more oil than I think....

I also have a High Pressure filter on the lift tilt dump circuit but no filtering for PTO.

 

[ponytug]

Carl- I think that your "big boy" is in the inlet to the makeup oil to the tram, i.e. the charge pump. It is large to have low cavitation under the vacuum conditions of cold start up charging. The other fine filter is one I would like to have and is a fine filter on the rest of the oil via the lift/steering/curl circuit. Based on my knowledge filtration, I think that it is a toss up whether repeated 30 micron filtration is better than low flow 2 micron filtration. The PTO filtration has the advantage of high volume polishing, while the lift/curl/steering circuit has the advantage of low flow.

All the best,

Peter

All the best,

Peter

 

[woodlandfarms]

sorry on the hijack, but just to be clear. The filter on the tram pump is pretty worthless, right? not much oil (relatively) goes through that system. The PTO of course would be the best, right?

 

[MossRoad]

I'm gonna say right, and wrong. Its not worthless if you consider it is the only thing protecting the entire tram circuit, which is the variable volume pump and 4 wheel motors. As I understand it, that is essentially a closed loop system with makeup oil coming from the tank, through that filter and into the charge pump inside the variable volume pump. It does not filter the PTO circuit. On the 400 series, that is the only filter.

 

[ponytug]

As MR points out that one filter protects the most expensive components on your tractor, which I think is worth something. In addition to the tram (variable volume pump), you have the four wheel motors, and that is a pretty expensive set. On the 18XX series, the motors have case drains that return some oil back to the main system. Carl, I believe your 1850 is older, and has the extra filter. Terry once mentioned to me that they didn't feel it was useful to have the extra filter in the 18XX series. I can't recall the reasoning. Possible rationales might have been power loss and the fact that the case drains return filtered oil to the main tank.

All the best,

Peter

I'm gonna say right, and wrong. Its not worthless if you consider it is the only thing protecting the entire tram circuit, which is the variable volume pump and 4 wheel motors. As I understand it, that is essentially a closed loop system with makeup oil coming from the tank, through that filter and into the charge pump inside the variable volume pump. It does not filter the PTO circuit. On the 400 series, that is the only filter.