More fun.....pump goes

[jfh28]

Well my winter fun continues........was out plowing during the latest 19" snow blast when I lost all power to the wheels. I was down at the bottom of the drive clearing out on the road when everything just went....no warning...no sounds......just suddenly no resistance on the treadle and I started to roll down the road backwards. Naturally this is the steepest part of the road so it didn't take long for gravity to do its thing and I quickly bested the top rated speed for a moving PT.....haha. It took a few seconds for the brain to register what was happening as I was pushing on the treadle without getting a response.....fortunately the pto/steering was still active and I dropped the plow to try to slow down and turned into a snow bank to stop........probably traveled about 50 feet backwards.

I was hoping it was just a loose link on the treadle but that was not the case......a call to Terry brought the news that he thinks it's the pump. So had to get a tow truck to get me out of the bank and back to the garage and am now in the process of labeling and removing all the hoses so I can remove the pump to send down for them to look at. And of course all this happens when we are getting all these storms barreling through and it's costing me $200 a pop to have the drive plowed........Jack

 

[coolconnection]

They always go when you need them most. I was pushing snow as well when my Pump went out a few years ago. 350 foot drive and had to finish it with shovel. My swash plate in the pump went out with less than 50 hours on the machine. The bad thing it really stinks that it happens the good thing is you really get to know how your machine is made.

 

[jfh28]

yup...they go out when you need them the most.....and the absolutely furthest away from tools and garage as possible! My drives 1/4 mile long so hand shoveling is not an option.......I thought about it....briefly........but then sanity prevailed....haha. I'm embarrassed to say that even though I've had my pt for 9 years I only have a little over 250 hours on it.......so not exactly a heavy user......mostly snow plowing. The only strain I can think of is that the wheels will spin when it gets bogged down in snow......and I do have to do a lot of forward and reverse movement in the heavier snows.....don't know if that contributed to it or not........Jack

 

[ernemats]

Sounds like what happened to me on my 422 several months ago. I was going up a hill and all of a sudden it just stopped going forward , pushing the forward or reverse made no response . It turned out the key in the shaft had broken or worn out. It ended up I had a local machine shop cut a new key way in the shaft and got a new love joy coupler from power trac and I was back in business.

 

[jfh28]

I've got 4 more hoses to disconnect.......a real bear to get to some of them.......the hose from the filter to the tram pump looks like I have to disconnect it from the filter first and then I can remove the flare fitting with the hose from the pump?

 

[coolconnection]

Sorry about your luck jfh28. Label everything well and take pictures of you can and even draw sketches if you need to. There certainly is quite a few houses to deal with. Turnaround from PT was pretty quick for me. I got a pump back on warranty but don't know if it was new or a rebuilt one but it is working now. Good luck.

 

[MossRoad]

Something else to consider.... you're going to have to drain the entire hydraulic system and flush it, aren't you?

 

[jfh28]

hmmm.....no one has mentioned doing that yet. I was going to change the filter when I put it back together. Whats the general feeling on flushing it from people who have had to remove the pump and how does one even go about flushing it?

 

[cqaigy2]

I didn't empty my tank on purpose.....

 

[ponytug]

I'd ask the oracle...Terry probably has some advice on whether and how to do it. Other than serially disconnecting joints, cranking the engine with the treadle depressed, blowing a quantity of oil out the line and then tightening the lines one by one, both forward and reverse, I don't see how you would do it.

I have a vague memory that Terry said for the initial build that they do something similar, but I don't remember the details.

Personally, I'd think about the cost / benefits to doing it. Minor hassle now versus potentially blown pump and motors. :confused3: Hmmm... :laughing: I come down on the ounce of prevention side, but I understand that there are lots of "it depends". Practically, my work environment is not an indoor, dust free shop, so I tend to be conservative about doing the extras that I can do.

Since I never hop on my PT and go for a joy ride, if the PT dies, it would always be in the middle of something important.:cool2: I think it is indicative of the utility of these machines- they are always helping us out somehow, someway.

All the best,

Peter