NX4510 Parking Brake Failure - Life/Safety issue

[Civich]

The title says it. The parking brake, a vital safety feature on any modern tractor, has failure designed into it on my 2015 NX4510. This problem has been discussed before with various owner fixes suggested but my question is - has anyone gotten Kioti USA to provide a fix for this life safety issue regardless of warranty status? - Chris

 

[rademamj1]

Chris, not exactly sure how your parking brake was designed to fail. I fully agree, any tractor used on hills and steep slopes, needs that parking brake to be reliable. It is critical to safety. I am assuming that you have brought your tractor into a Kioti dealer for repairs, and the repairs have not been successful. Have you been making necessary adjustments to your parking brake, due to wear from continuous use. Just trying to get more information on your problem.

 

[Civich]

Chris, not exactly sure how your parking brake was designed to fail. I fully agree, any tractor used on hills and steep slopes, needs that parking brake to be reliable. It is critical to safety. I am assuming that you have brought your tractor into a Kioti dealer for repairs, and the repairs have not been successful. Have you been making necessary adjustments to your parking brake, due to wear from continuous use. Just trying to get more information on your problem.

Thanks for your interest. It's raining so I finally have time to reply. The brakes are adjusted. The parking brake engagement pawl and tooth plate are worn to failure. I can't for the life of me figure out how to insert photos on this site so if you are interested the problem is exactly as shown in a previous discussion in 2013 about a 2005 CK30H by dfkrug:

https://www.tractorbynet.com/forums...g/286134-kioti-parking-brake-failure-has.html

The fix is straight-forward: buy and replace the right brake pedal and the toothed brake engagement lever. And repeat when those fail - which they will in another 400 hours. Thus my "designed to fail" statement. The design is cheesy and wears to failure quickly. Life gets interesting when I set the parking brake, shift my HST to neutral (all per Kioti safety procedure), get off the tractor to open a gate, hear a sharp 'snap' as the worn pawl vibrates free of the worn tooth lever and the tractor goes rolling away by it's merry self. My local dealer will do the work - for a price. Kioti will not pay for it since the tractor is out of warranty. So how can such an important safety mechanism continue to be installed in Kioti tractors when it will fail simply because it is used and the consequence of abrupt failure can be injurious if not deadly? It's a parking brake for Pete's sake; I operate 20 year old tractors at a pecan orchard and the simple hand lever parking brakes have never been a source of concern.

 

[Industrial Toys]

Unless a machine had two seperate park brake means, like a vehicle with a parking pawl and an E-Brake, I wouldn't trust it to hold. I always turn the wheels into a hill, put the loader down or other such precaution. Mostly avoid parking on a hill if possible.

 

[bailbud]

mine failed at about 500hrs on my ck 25 , replaced the lever from dealer . failed again at 1200 hrs , pulled it off built up the gears with some hardening weld and ground out new grooves seems to be working so far.

 

[rademamj1]

Thanks to Civich and this forum, I now have a much better understanding of the "failed design" of the Kioti emergency brake. After reading about this, it seems Kioti could simply fix the issue permanently at the factory with a stronger steel unit. Perhaps even stainless steel unit that will handle the continous use some owners give it, for the life of the tractor. Kioti could even make it a major selling point for sales.

 

[MinnesotaEric]

I've got 650 hours on my NX6010 and I use the parking brake all the time (when I leave the tractor running and get out) and have not experienced the problems you have experienced

I'd like to see photos of the feeble thingy that is failing.

When posting click on the "Go Advanced" button the immediate bottom right of the text entry box and attach a photo.

Alternatively, upload photos to a photo hosting site like Flickr.com and insert the html code into the text entry box.

 

[Civich]

Well either I've gotten stupid or my computer has but I find it impossible to insert any images into this thread. The wear is similar to the one shown in the thread which I referred to earlier. In my model tractor (2015 NX4510H ROPS model, 400+ hrs) the parking brake is released by stepping on the brake - this lets whatever tooth is holding it (on the spring loaded parking brake engagement lever) slide up and over the fixed pawl (welded to the right brake pedal arm). This causes wear with each use resulting eventually in a groove being cut in the fixed pawl and the teeth being worn to the point (literally) where they are no longer able to capture the pawl. Perhaps other (cab model?) Kioti tractors have a different parking brake set-up but with two thin (1/8") mild steel parts sliding perpendicularly against each other and under spring loaded pressure the wear to failure is assured. Sorry for the 1000 words and no picture. - Chris

 

[Civich]

In looking at the owner's manual it appears as though the parking brake on my tractor is only on the hydrostatic drive ROPS models. The tractors with cabs have a different (and possibly superior) set-up.

 

[MinnesotaEric]

Well either I've gotten stupid or my computer has but I find it impossible to insert any images into this thread. The wear is similar to the one shown in the thread which I referred to earlier. In my model tractor (2015 NX4510H ROPS model, 400+ hrs) the parking brake is released by stepping on the brake - this lets whatever tooth is holding it (on the spring loaded parking brake engagement lever) slide up and over the fixed pawl (welded to the right brake pedal arm). This causes wear with each use resulting eventually in a groove being cut in the fixed pawl and the teeth being worn to the point (literally) where they are no longer able to capture the pawl. Perhaps other (cab model?) Kioti tractors have a different parking brake set-up but with two thin (1/8") mild steel parts sliding perpendicularly against each other and under spring loaded pressure the wear to failure is assured. Sorry for the 1000 words and no picture. - Chris

That's descriptive enough for me to know what I'm looking for. We're experiencing third winter right now here in north-central Minnesota, but when it warms up enough, I'll take a look and if anything needs welding, I'll hit it. Thanks.