Question re: Steering Cylinder Seals

[BobRip]

When I took the PT class, I was told to hose off the cylinder shaft after each use. The removes the dirt and grit and extends the seal life. No problems at 500 hours. Has anyone else heard this.

Edit - I don't actually hose the shafts after each use, but I do it fairly often.

Bob Rip

 

[Sedgewood]

<font color="red"> The main reason I think it’s the seals is because that’s what it was before with the same behavior and that’s what I’m hoping it is this time (because the steering valve is much more expensive </font>

I can vouch for that, having rebuilt my steering valve only to discover the problem was actually broken piston seals in one cylinder. Ha! /forums/images/graemlins/tongue.gif

To get a PT seal kit for the cylinder, I had to buy 4 because of Power-Trac's silly $50.00 minimum order. If anyone needs a #K026 seal kit, I'd be glad to part with one.

There's a topic here on the forum about my foolishness and an article at my website {here}. (BTW I've been fixing up my site a bit and this is a new URL).

Sedgewood

 

[SnowRidge]

<font color="blue"> When I took the PT class, I was told to hose off the cylinder shaft after each use. The removes the dirt and grit and extends the seal life. No problems at 500 hours. Has anyone else heard this. </font>

I don't remember anything like that from the time we took the training. Who was your trainer? I do spray the rams with Superlube at each service, as instructed.

Considering that the machine is made for working in the dirt, you would think the rams would be designed with that in mind. I don't see anyone at the construction sites hosing off their cylinder shafts at the end of the day. /forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif

 

[J_J]

If you want to check your steering cylinders for leakage or blowby, do this, with the right cylinder fully extended, remove the hyd line at the shaft end. Turn the steering wheel more to the left. This will put pressure on the ram and seals, and if they are leaking, a small amount of fluid will be forced out of the port that is open. If that is ok, reconnect the front hyd line and do the same check on the back port. Do the same procedure on the other cylinder if you have two cylinders. What you are doing here is allowing yourself to see the blowby or leakage. I did this with my lift cylinders, and found out they were leaking. If you don't feel qualified to do this, I would at least remove them and take them to a hydraulic shop for bench test.

 

[J_J]

What was the outcome on the steering cylinders? Did you have to replace the seals?

 

[marrt]

Frankly, I haven't gotten around to it yet. Last weekend, I changed the motor oil and filter, fuel filter, hydraulic filter and a bunch of other maintenance. I got oil all over the place. I bought one of those Jasco Shurflow oil change pumps that’s often used for marine diesel oil changes thinking it would be an easy job…but the pump didn’t work right. Basically, the oil would come up through the clear tube just fine, but would flow into the bucket only in small spurts…like it was getting air in the line somewhere.

For the steering cylinders, I think I’ll order the seal kits and then see how bad it is over the summer. I was just starting to notice the problem last year during the hot part of the summer.