Lost 4WD on my M7040

94BULLITT · Nov 4, 2012

r40kh said:
4WD lever moves fine and the indicator on the dash lights but definately not engaged as I tried to see if the front wheels would spin. I also lifted the front wheels off the ground and they can be spun by hand. I think that with the 4Wd engaged the front wheels would be coupled to rears and should not move but I'm not positive. I'll let the dealer figure it out

The front wheels should not turn with 4wd engaged.

r40kh · Nov 4, 2012

That's what I thought. Hopefully it will be something simple to repair. On a positive note I'm glad it happened now and not in the middle of a snow storm.

ericher69 · Nov 4, 2012

94BULLITT said:
The front wheels should not turn with 4wd engaged.

It's an open diff one wheel will spin the other shouldn't

94BULLITT · Nov 4, 2012

ericher69 said:
It's an open diff one wheel will spin the other shouldn't

Your right someone would need to hold one while he tries to turn the other.

gwdixon · Nov 5, 2012

On the M7040 the fronts have a limited slip differential.

I believe that if you spin one front wheel by hand the other goes the opposite direction (from what I've read). Others may have more information about this.

If the OP lifts the fronts with the FEL and tries this then at least he will know it is an engagement issue rather than the front end being stripped out.

As mentioned - it is a dealer problem now.

r40kh · Nov 7, 2012

Well the dealer arrived yesterday and took the tractor away to get repaired. Got a call this afternoon that the repair was complete and it would be returned tomorrow morning. I wasn't able to talk to the mechanic who did the repair but the service manager said the problem was in the linkage with one piece showing some corrosion which wasn't allowing it to move far enough to engage the 4WD. The fix was to remove the rear wheel and fuel tank which exposed the linkage in order for them to work at it. There's not much room between the fuel tank and all that linkage but in the future I'll keep it well dosed up with spray lubricant. I still find it odd that this could occur as all the linkage is exposed to the elements so there couldn't have been much concern by the manufacturer that there would be some issues with any of the pivot points. May have got a little sticky because I've only spent about a couple of hours with the 4WD engaged in the last 6 months. Anyway , problem appears to have been solved.