Bent bucket roll cylinders

[SMTractor]

I have a Massey E 2860 with a FLX 2815 loader. Has anyone heard of the role bucket roll cylinders bending? I have a 40 year old John Deere and have had to replace the bucket because of the pressures I put on it and I’ve never bent a cylinder. This seems unbelievable that the cylinder rod could be so soft they would bend.

 

[SMTractor]

I have a Massey E 2860 with a FLX 2815 loader. Has anyone heard of the role bucket roll cylinders bending? I have a 40 year old John Deere and have had to replace the bucket because of the pressures I put on it and I’ve never bent a cylinder. This seems unbelievable that the cylinder rod could be so soft they would bend.
Or has anyone heard of a recall on this issue?

 

[dfkrug]

Quite common, actually.

Watch out when back-grading with FEL bucket at full dump. Especially if you have a loader with only 1" rods.

All of my JDs were former rental tractors, and several had bent bucket cylinder rods. Mostly that was the 420 loader attachment with the skinny 25mm rods. They can be straightened if not bent too much.

 

[Henro]

Quite common, actually.

Watch out when back-grading with FEL bucket at full dump. Especially if you have a loader with only 1" rods.

All of my JDs were former rental tractors, and several had bent bucket cylinder rods. Mostly that was the 420 loader attachment with the skinny 25mm rods. They can be straightened if not bent too much.

Certainly true.

Problem being is cylinder rods are not really designed for compressive force when fully extended. In tension there’s no issue.

If one back drags with a bucket tilted fully down and the bucket cylinders fully extended. He is certainly asking for trouble. Especially if he catches the bucket lip on something like a small stump or a root or a rock.

Good practice to back drag with a bucket tilted fully up and using the back of the bucket to do the work for you. Or maybe just to keep the bucket tilted down slightly so the cylinders are retracted a lot more than they would be if the bucket was tilted down fully.

I know this is obvious to most long time tractor users, but I thought I would just mention the details for newer guys that might read this thread.

 

[Henro]

See this current thread….

Bent bucket roll cylinders

I have a Massey E 2860 with a FLX 2815 loader. Has anyone heard of the role bucket roll cylinders bending? I have a 40 year old John Deere and have had to replace the bucket because of the pressures I put on it and I’ve never bent a cylinder. This seems unbelievable that the cylinder rod could...

www.tractorbynet.com

 

[Henro]

I have a Massey E 2860 with a FLX 2815 loader. Has anyone heard of the role bucket roll cylinders bending? I have a 40 year old John Deere and have had to replace the bucket because of the pressures I put on it and I’ve never bent a cylinder. This seems unbelievable that the cylinder rod could be so soft they would bend.
Or has anyone heard of a recall on this issue?

Sorry but it is a bit strange to post the same question twice in different threads on the same site…

 

[Henro]

Sorry but it is a bit strange to post the same question twice in different threads on the same site…

Especially on the same day and only five minutes apart!

 

[5030]

Real easy to bend the cylinder rods when they are at full extension and you back drag with the lip of the bucket instead of doing it the correct way which is with the heel of the bucket, not the edge.

That holds especially true if the cutting lip encounters a hard to move object like a buried rock.

You made an expensive mistake by backdragging improperly.

They can be straightened by a competent hydraulic shop for a fee...

Has nothing to do with a recall and everything to do with you abusing your loader.

 

[nyone]

I back drag quite a bit with my machine..however it's never in virgin ground. Usualy I'm pulling the top down of a loose pile.

 

[loggin]

I have always done a fare bit of backdragging with my front end loader but never at full extension of the curl cylinders and almost always in float position of the lift cylinders. Be very careful if you are using the weight of the machine when backdragging to not overload the curl cylinders.

Just my 2 cents..

 

[Shenandoah MF1760]

I have a Massey E 2860 with a FLX 2815 loader. Has anyone heard of the role bucket roll cylinders bending? I have a 40 year old John Deere and have had to replace the bucket because of the pressures I put on it and I’ve never bent a cylinder. This seems unbelievable that the cylinder rod could be so soft they would bend.

Yes. I have a 1760 with the 2814 FEL and I bent the same side you did.

I believe mine happened when a branch came through my grapple and undid one of the QA levers resulting in the grapple falling off the FEL on one side while it was lifted.

When I went to replace the cylinder I discovered that Massey had two different ones for the same FEL. One had a larger diameter rod and was obviously the replacement for the one that bent frequently. (insert inappropriate inflammatory language).

Being cheap I wasn't about to replace both cylinders although I wanted to. So, I gambled that all I needed was the rod assembly and not the entire cylinder. it's not too difficult to replace, but you won't find that construction type if cylinder on youtube so don't bother looking. That was two years ago and the repair has been working just fine.

 

[BCLoco]

Don't listen to the person making asinine comments about abusing your loader. He has no idea what happened and he obviously doesn't know that these loaders did have a sort of recall on the curl cylinders.

Many, many people have had this happen in situations where it really shouldn't have. Here's one example on YouTube:

The rods have been upsized since November 2021. See screenshot below. Dealers and their local AGCO rep will consider the replacement of these cylinders on a case-by-case basis. The new rods are 4mm larger in diameter. That may not sound like much, but that works out to almost 27% more cross section. Huge upgrade, and the only reason they do that is because they screwed up the first design.

I did that to mine with the grapple open wide, bushing down into a pile of brush with the curl cylinders almost fully extended . One of the big limbs near the top lip of the grapple caught on something hard and stopped dead. The leverage was too much for the extended rods and they both bent a fair bit.

To fix mine I just put a towel-wrapped 2x4 (on the flat) between the cylinder rod and the loader frame at the point where they were the most bent, and extended the curl cylinders again until the rod started to bend back. Kept doing this slowly and carefully, and checking with an accurate straight edge until they were within a couple thousandths of straight. Worked really well actually. Mine were a simple bend in the middle of the rod, so it made sense to try it as I had nothing to lose. 1 year and many, many loads of material later, and the curl cylinders are doing just fine. Still straight, and no sign of leakage or scuffing on the cylinder rod.

If you're going to try this, keep in mind that you have to force the rod to slightly overbend in the opposite direction because the steel will just spring back to the bent position if you don't. Safest bet is take it to a professional. Most hydraulic shops or machine shops can do the repair for you, or refer you to someone who can.

EDIT: I just looked at your pics. You could try the wrapped 2x4 repair on the right one, the left one I wouldn't bother even trying it. Bend is in a bad place. You can undo the rod-side pin on that rod and turn the rod 180 to orient the rod for straightening, but it's too close to the cylinder and I don't think there's much chance of fixing that one.

 

[JRH02]

Its certainly not impossible to tweak cylinder rams. I was using a 8hp 26 ton splitter (two stage pump) to mash some smoking wood. The pieces were in 4" lengths and I slit them down to 3/4 to 1" squares 4" long. I started mashing perpendicular to the grain and several times the pump went to the second stage with the ram (1 1/2" dia) most of the way out. I was watching the wood not the ram. Gee wiz, guess what happened? It took on a slight bow but still works fine if I use it for what it was designed to do ever since.

 

[5030]

Don't listen to the person making asinine comments about abusing your loader. He has no idea what happened and he obviously doesn't know that these loaders did have a sort of recall on the curl cylinders.

Many, many people have had this happen in situations where it really shouldn't have. Here's one example on YouTube:

The rods have been upsized since November 2021. See screenshot below. Dealers and their local AGCO rep will consider the replacement of these cylinders on a case-by-case basis. The new rods are 4mm larger in diameter. That may not sound like much, but that works out to almost 27% more cross section. Huge upgrade, and the only reason they do that is because they screwed up the first design.

I did that to mine with the grapple open wide, bushing down into a pile of brush with the curl cylinders almost fully extended . One of the big limbs near the top lip of the grapple caught on something hard and stopped dead. The leverage was too much for the extended rods and they both bent a fair bit.

To fix mine I just put a towel-wrapped 2x4 (on the flat) between the cylinder rod and the loader frame at the point where they were the most bent, and extended the curl cylinders again until the rod started to bend back. Kept doing this slowly and carefully, and checking with an accurate straight edge until they were within a couple thousandths of straight. Worked really well actually. Mine were a simple bend in the middle of the rod, so it made sense to try it as I had nothing to lose. 1 year and many, many loads of material later, and the curl cylinders are doing just fine. Still straight, and no sign of leakage or scuffing on the cylinder rod.

If you're going to try this, keep in mind that you have to force the rod to slightly overbend in the opposite direction because the steel will just spring back to the bent position if you don't. Safest bet is take it to a professional. Most hydraulic shops or machine shops can do the repair for you, or refer you to someone who can.

EDIT: I just looked at your pics. You could try the wrapped 2x4 repair on the right one, the left one I wouldn't bother even trying it. Bend is in a bad place. You can undo the rod-side pin on that rod and turn the rod 180 to orient the rod for straightening, but it's too close to the cylinder and I don't think there's much chance of fixing that one.

My only comment to you is.... The tooth fairy didn't bend the rod, the operator did, by abusing it beyond it's design limits.

 

[JRH02]

Safest bet is take it to a professional. Most hydraulic shops or machine shops can do the repair for you, or refer you to someone who can.

Make sure they are competent because if they mar or make an indentation on the ram it will leak from then on - they destroyed the ram.

 

[5030]

That depends entirely on how deep the 'mar' is and how flexible the packing seals are. Most all hydraulic rams are hard chromed to begin with to combat corrosion.

Finally it's the curl cylinders not roll cylinders, haven't a clue what a roll cylinder is.