So I busted my curl cylinder ... can't find parts to fix it

[hutchman]

I was back filling a culvert and I somehow broke my curl function. Can't move the bucket once it is in dumped position.

I had the bucket angled down and up off the ground just enough to push some lose dirt to spread it around over the culvert without picking any dirt up and got to the point where I was skimming off more than I wanted and made a quick move in the wrong direction with the loader arms ... wanted to go up and instead went down into the ground while I was slowly moving forward and it was like something broke and my bucket went completely back (dumped) and wouldn't go back up. I got off and looked around and couldn't see anything broken. If I put the stick in curl up position and held it there I could go backwards and lower the loader arms and could get the bucket to rock back in the almost level/curled up position and then the hydraulics would kick in for about the last 3" of the stroke and hold the bucket but if I went to curl down the bucket would move an inch or two then just let go and swing freely to the dump position and then I couldn't move it either way again.

Instead of towing whole thing to my dealer who is like an hour away, I'll probably just take the cylinders off myself. I looked at my parts manual and realized it doesn't cover the loader at all. A quick search of all the online parts vendors doesn't reveal any kind of hydraulic parts for the loader either.

Has anyone here had to have cylinders on the loader worked on? If I just take the cylinders to a hydraulic shop will they be able to figure out and source what is needed or would I need to go through dealer? Tractor is past warranty at this point.

I think I probably messed up a piston or seal.

 

[PJSprog]

My tractor came with two manuals; one for the tractor, and one for the loader. You'll probably need to get the loader manual.

 

[Shaneard]

We have a hydraulic place near my work, I can take a cylinder apart and take my parts there and they can match them up to a kit or make me one. If you do that you shouldn't have a problem locating your parts.

 

[Egon]

Have you checked out the control valve.

Pull the cylinder arm pins off of the bucket and check to see how they move by hand. If you can't pull the rod out chances are the cylinders are okay.

 

[hutchman]

Have you checked out the control valve.

Pull the cylinder arm pins off of the bucket and check to see how they move by hand. If you can't pull the rod out chances are the cylinders are okay.

No, I haven't taken anything apart yet but when I do I'll try that. I figured that if I have to do work and replace piston/seals in one ... that I would probably go ahead and replace seals in the other one too so they would be the same (one not stronger than the other).

 

[hutchman]

My tractor came with two manuals; one for the tractor, and one for the loader. You'll probably need to get the loader manual.

I have the loader manual I just can't find what I did with it at the moment. I have a .pdf of the parts manual for the tractor but apparently that doesn't cover loader parts list. I'm not sure if I saw a parts list in my printed manual but it's been a while since I've looked at it. I mostly just look at it for torque values.

 

[countrybumpkin]

My guess is you pulled one or both of the pistons off the end of the cylinder rod inside the cylinder. I would check both cylinders if thats what you find wrong. Its a pretty easy to check but very messy. If you wanted to check them , take the pin out of the rod end next to the bucket and see if you can pull the rod out of the cylinder. If it does then you have found your problem. but be ready for a couple quarts of hydraulic fluid to spill out.

 

[George2615]

The loader only has a 1 year warranty so probably won't be covered. Hope its something simple.

 

[Deere Dude]

I had a bucket that wouldn't hold the curl so I got a couple seal kits and took them apart. The seals were bad and not terribly difficult to fix. One thing I noticed on mine was the nuts that held the metal piston were loose and had a lot of slop. I can envision one of those coming loose. Then I locktited them up.

 

[TSO]

I can't imagine that you damaged both cylinders at the same time on a relatively new tractor. I would first check all your hoses and hose connections... Might have had a pressure overload pop a hose fitting or connection.

 

[hutchman]

I can't imagine that you damaged both cylinders at the same time on a relatively new tractor. I would first check all your hoses and hose connections... Might have had a pressure overload pop a hose fitting or connection.

The way these cylinders are hooked up ... if one cylinder fails the other one won't move at all is my understanding. Do I have that wrong?

I did have like a drop or two on the fittings of what I think is the offending cylinder but no busted hoses etc. At first I thought maybe I took out a "shock" valve but I don't think these little tractors have anything like that ... I think it's only bigger more expensive machines that are equipped with stuff like that.

 

[zzvyb6]

To me, it sounds like you are low on hydraulic fluid and have an air gap in the line. With all cylinders filled, you might have emptied the reservoir. Check the dipstick and put a gallon in it and see if it recovers.

 

[whis]

you broke what I call the puck off of one of the cylinder rods. if it was held on by a big nut you can drill and tap a hole in the rod and install puck with a bolt. use a fine thread allen head bolt

 

[hutchman]

Hmm, so this looks like a 'minor' problem:



It rained the night I broke it and was quite muddy from several days of rain but I was finally able to get to it and tear it apart today. I followed the advice to try and pull the rod out first before going too far. The cylinder I thought was the culprit wouldn't pull out. Did the same thing on the other one and sure enough it pulled right out!

It's the cylinder on the right side with the bucket level indicator on it.

Took to my local hydraulic shop and we tore it down and found the nut and inspected everything. The part left in the nut is at a funny angle. The threads on the rod looked funny to me. It's like where the threads start is not perfectly centered on the rod. There is a small flat that is offset then the threads start. If you look at the picture above where the view is down from the top of the rod ... the flat I'm talking about is on the top. That's not the camera angle.

You can actually see wavy metal in the bore where the bucket level indicator bracket is welded to the cylinder.

So local shop said the rod can't be fixed. Said the piston and seals all look good through and the inside of the bore isn't scratched up and they checked the rod on a trued surface and it looks like the rod is good too (well, minus the end that broke off).

They told me of a shop that can duplicate the rod so I'm going to make a trip to see them tomorrow and see what they say and get a quote.

I called my dealer and sent them pictures (they are not close by) and copied LS HQ. It sounded like they would quote me an entire cylinder but I asked if it was possible to just purchase the rod.

If the broke one is repairable, I'm going to have my local shop repack both so they preform the same. They have about 610hrs on them.

whis, interesting idea on drilling/tapping the rod. I'll ask about that option with the people I meet tomorrow. It looks cast to me so that probably rules out welding it etc., but I didn't think of drilling and tapping it.

 

[whis]

we did that on a loader about 5 years ago and it has held up fine. it is used almost every day with a grapple doing brush clean up for tree service and i promise it is not babied it has the snot worked out of it. all they need to do is put in a lathe and turn the rest of the threads off and then drill and tap we did fine threads and used loctite

 

[hutchman]

we did that on a loader about 5 years ago and it has held up fine. it is used almost every day with a grapple doing brush clean up for tree service and i promise it is not babied it has the snot worked out of it

I know a guy that owns a local CNC shop. He's done lots of projects for me in the past. If anyone can make a hole concentric he can. Plus he's close by so after consulting all the hydraulic yoda's I'll show it to him and see what he says. Something tells me that would be the cheapest fix but sometimes his shop gets real busy and I have to wait for some idle time ... he's not going to shut down the expensive machines in a middle of a run for a 'one of' for me

 

[hutchman]

We have a hydraulic place near my work, I can take a cylinder apart and take my parts there and they can match them up to a kit or make me one. If you do that you shouldn't have a problem locating your parts.

Hydraulic shop acted like everything they found in there were common seals etc., which is what I was hoping for. They see and fix a whole lot more cylinders than my not-so-close small dealer.

Last week my co-worker who has busted a few cylinders on his backhoe (catches the bucket on the ground when going up a hill) brought in a piston for show and tell. It was pretty large and looked aluminum. Had a single channel milled around it where a seal went. The root of that channel was fractured and the lip/edge of the piston lifted up and the pressure forced the seal through the fracture in the metal! Pretty cool looking.

The piston on this curl cylinder didn't look aluminum and had several seals around it. I'll try to get pictures of the guts and post them. When I was at the shop we were kind of busy and had hydraulic fluid everywhere so I didn't think to grab the phone for pics.

 

[hutchman]

Found parts list for bucket cylinder

View attachment LL3101-Bucket cylinder RH.pdf

 

[wdchyd]

Yep, easy fix for hyd shop

 

[hutchman]

Yep, easy fix for hyd shop

Cool video!

I went to the place that makes rods today. They said it would be $30-$40 in material plus about two hours of labor so around $150. I found out I can order a new rod from LS for about $58 so I went that route and ordered it today.

Also noticed the threads/nuts on the two cylinders rods are different. I found the .pdf of the left LH cylinder parts list and it lists the part numbers of the nut as being the same so something funny has gone on at some point. The nuts look different in physical appearance too besides the threads being different.

Left hand parts list:
View attachment LL3101-Bucket cylinder LH.pdf