Possible hydraulic issue

[fruitcakesa]

I just got a call from a friend with an L3010 HST.
He put a tow ball on his 3 pt spreader bar to pull his wood splitter but did not like it rotating around as he towed the splitter.
In a fit of inspiration [without a lot of forethought] he lowered the sidelinks and attached the outboard end of his toplink to the spreader bar to stabilize things.
Here is where the lack of forethought came in:
He then got back on the tractor and pulled the 3 pt control lever to raise things and heard a loud bang behind him.
When he looked back he saw that the toplink had bent and broken
Oh well he said, and proceeded to load the bucket with split wood and drive off.
All of a sudden, the bucket curled down half way and dumped some of the wood. He pulled on the joystick and curled the bucket back up and drove to the barn and parked it.
The question he asked me was, did he do some sort of damage to a component in the hydraulic system? He said all the loader and 3ph functions operated properly afterward. Initially he saw a slight fluid leak on one of the lift cylinders but later on could not reproduce it.
I know this is all 2nd hand info and I never saw the machine. I am just the messenger
Any ideas?

 

[kthompson]

Would not think he damage the hyd system. Would not be shocked to learn he damage the transmission housing where the third arm is pinned to it. It is not impossible if he was driving around trees a branch hit the loader lever dumping the bucket?

 

[fruitcakesa]

Would not think he damage the hyd system. Would not be shocked to learn he damage the transmission housing where the third arm is pinned to it. It is not impossible if he was driving around trees a branch hit the loader lever dumping the bucket?

I asked him if he might have inadvertently hit the lever; he was pretty sure he did not but not 100%.
Someone mentioned the possibility of the hit causing momentary cavitation in the system which caused the bucket to curl once.