3 point lift has 5 second delay

[Rudevette]

It's a bobcat but since it's the same as kioti here goes:

So my Bobcat Ct235 has about 150 hours on it now. It is a couple of years old. :confused2: I changed all fluids and filters at 65 hours and everything was fine. This morning I ran 3 miles down the road doing some snowplowing, a little blowing, etc. to get the road opened so my wife could get home from work. Everything worked fine. Tractor was about out of fuel so I parked it by the house and went to town to get fuel and take care of some business. When I got home 5 or 6 hours later I fueled it up and started it, jumped on it and blew snow back aways. Then when I went to lift the blower it didn't lift. It takes about 5 seconds, then I hear the pump make some whining noise and the blower lifts. It drops just fine and the drop speed adjustment knob is not the problem because it makes no difference where it's set. The rear hydraulic remote is hooked up to the chute rotator on the snowblower and it works perfectly. The loader works perfectly. All are fast and responsive. It's just the 3 point that is having a problem. Can anybody help me out here?

Thanks,
Justin

 

[oldnslo]

It's a bobcat but since it's the same as kioti here goes:

So my Bobcat Ct235 has about 150 hours on it now. It is a couple of years old. :confused2: I changed all fluids and filters at 65 hours and everything was fine. This morning I ran 3 miles down the road doing some snowplowing, a little blowing, etc. to get the road opened so my wife could get home from work. Everything worked fine. Tractor was about out of fuel so I parked it by the house and went to town to get fuel and take care of some business. When I got home 5 or 6 hours later I fueled it up and started it, jumped on it and blew snow back aways. Then when I went to lift the blower it didn't lift. It takes about 5 seconds, then I hear the pump make some whining noise and the blower lifts. It drops just fine and the drop speed adjustment knob is not the problem because it makes no difference where it's set. The rear hydraulic remote is hooked up to the chute rotator on the snowblower and it works perfectly. The loader works perfectly. All are fast and responsive. It's just the 3 point that is having a problem. Can anybody help me out here?

Thanks,
Justin

Does this model have draft control? If yes is it possible that while blowing snow a little snow got packed in around the linkage and melted from the tranny warmth. You then parked it for a few hours and froze up causing some binding. Just a guess but I have had snow freeze the throttle linkage up before.

Roy

 

[Rudevette]

The only draft control is the knob on by the floor that slows down the lowering speed of the 3 point. It works fine. I can get it to drop very fast to very slow and everywhere in between. I didn't see any ice frozen to anything on the trans either. (on the outside that it)

 

[Patches]

Sounds like something in the three point assembly is "frozen and/or binding". I would suggest a carefull scan of the lift arms and the assocciated pins/linkages. The whining would probably be the relief valve saving your pump

 

[LastSTRAW]

Do you or a friend have a building you could move the tractor into? Let it run for a while warm up and melt all the snow to see if you have the same problem. It could be an easy fix.

 

[Rudevette]

Ok. I just went out and played with it. Once I pull the lever to lift it takes between 16 and 18 seconds to lift. The noise it makes is the engine starting to take some load as it goes up. It does not whine like a hydraulic bypass valve bypassing. There is no snow or ice anywhere on it. I will try sticking it in the garage as a last ditch effort

 

[Coyote machine]

It's a bobcat but since it's the same as kioti here goes:<snip>Bobcat Ct235 has about 150 hours on it now. It is a couple of years old. :confused2: I changed all fluids and filters at 65 hours and everything was fine. This morning I ran 3 miles down the road doing some snowplowing, a little blowing, etc. to get the road opened so my wife could get home from work. Everything worked fine. Tractor was about out of fuel so I parked it by the house and went to town to get fuel and take care of some business. When I got home 5 or 6 hours later I fueled it up and started it, jumped on it and blew snow back aways. Then when I went to lift the blower it didn't lift. It takes about 5 seconds, then I hear the pump make some whining noise and the blower lifts. It drops just fine and the drop speed adjustment knob is not the problem because it makes no difference where it's set. The rear hydraulic remote is hooked up to the chute rotator on the snowblower and it works perfectly. Do you have an A/B lever for your remotes that might be in the wrong position? Have you verified hydraulic fluid level recently? The loader works perfectly. All are fast and responsive. It's just the 3 point that is having a problem. Can anybody help me out here?

Thanks,
Justin

Please see questions above in blue.

Thanks, CM

 

[Rudevette]

Fluid level is good and I only have one set of remotes and the control lever is in the neutral position. If it was stuck in either detent the chute rotator would be stuck all the way one wy or the other.

 

[LaVoie Equipment]

Fluid level is good and I only have one set of remotes and the control lever is in the neutral position. If it was stuck in either detent the chute rotator would be stuck all the way one wy or the other.

Could have piece of trash in MLS valve. This is the valve under seat that controls drop rate of 3 point hitch. Slim chance but possible. Before that check all your hydraulic lines, you could be sucking air in somewhere causing this problem. Check fill cap on rear and make sure air will pass through. Thats it without looking at it myself.

Tony

 

[LaVoie Equipment]

Yes I saw you say it couldn't be "drop valve" but it can. Oil has to flow through it.

 

[Rudevette]

I just checked the fill cap. The breather hole on it is open. I can't imagine what could be stuck in a port somewhere. Maybe a little water that froze inside a small hole? It's odd that it worked fine until I shut it off then all of a sudden there's a problem after sitting. It was warm and had a lot of water on it from the melted snow that was steaming off when I shut it down so maybe something got water in it then froze?.....?????

 

[Coyote machine]

So is that to say it's working now? Could have been that water condensed inside the vent and caused the problem, maybe?

 

[Rudevette]

no it still isn't working.

 

[J_J]

You could install a hyd gage, and check your pressure readings on all the valves.

If you are using QD's, one of them might have un-connected. Try resetting the QD's.

One of the QD's might be choking off the fluid to the 3pt.

 

[Rudevette]

Thanks. I will try that today.

 

[Rudevette]

I removed my MLS valve and tore it down according to the shop manual. I didn't really find anything in it. It's just clean oil in there. I did notice the following things that I attached pictures of:
1. the first picture is of the pilot spool. In the manual it says "orientation of balancing passage in one end of the spool is very important. This balancing passage must be assembled facing towards the cap of spool valve"
I removed the spool just like you see it in the pictures. It looks to me like the holes in the side of the spool may be a "balancing passage" and that the spool is in backwards? But that wouldn't explain why it would quit working all of a sudden.

2. the next two pictures are of the valve seat and pilot valve. It looks to me like the valve seat has the machined angled face machined on the wrong side of the seat. The valve is conical and sits on top of a spring in the bore. The seat has an oring that has to go oring first into the bore or the oring won't seal anything. Then the end plate holds it in there. The surface where the valve seats against is a square edged hole that isn't really machined, just drilled through the seat. The other side of the seat that sticks out of the valve and nothing at all seats against it is a machined angled face that fits the valve angled face perfectly although when assembled they don't touch. Look at the pictures carefully. That's how they came out of the valve. It looks like the seat has the seat face machined on the wrong side or the oring groove is machined on the wrong end. One or the other. But that doesn't really explain why it quit working all of a sudden either.

Any help? I must have done something because after slipping that mls valve back in it doesn't do anything now.

 

[powerpace]

I would check the fluid with the 3 point up and Down. On a level surface.
Could you have air in the line. If cold moisture in a line could freeze.

 

[Rudevette]

The fluid level is fine. It can't be frozen moisture because it's in a garage that's 60 degrees. I can't check the fluid with it up because it won't go up.

 

[Rudevette]

I took that MLS valve apart today again with a local mechanic watching me and we looked over the linkage and the MLS valve together and both agree that we see nothing wrong.

I spoke with the service departments of the dealers around here. There are 2 of them. Either one is multiple hundreds of miles of hauling to get the tractor there. Neither one of them had any idea what to do. And I was wrong about the hours on the tractor. It has 120 hours, not 150 hours.

Adding all that up I've decided that the lifespan of these scrap metal tractors is 120 hours then they're shot. It's going to cost me $200 in diesel fuel alone to haul this worthless piece of junk to the dealer then there's no guarantee that they can fix it either. I am taking it to my local Kubota dealer to see if they will either sell it on consignment as is or take it on trade for a new Kubota or New Holland.

Lesson learned. It was expensive school.

 

[MichiganIron]

The problem you described is normally foreign material in the MLS Valve. If you have loader control and Rear Remote Power, you really isolated the problem to the MLS Valve. Now that nothing works probably means you have something a little goofy when the valve was re-assembled. With these things, it's best to forget about what you think it should look like and re-assemble exactly the way it came apart. Since it worked fine until recently, you want it back together the way it came apart.

The Rear Remote is a selector valve in the tractor Power Beyond system. It selects between the 3-point MLS Valve and the Rear Plugs. If you have spec pressure at the rear remotes when you lever is engaged, then you will also have spec pressure at the MLS Valve when you selector lever is in neutral.

Carefully re-assemble the MLS Valve, making sure everything is clean and lightly oiled. It "sounds like" your spool is sticking.