Bruce's Journal

[greybeard]

I still have 4 hours to run the tractor before I change the filters and the front axle fluid.

If it's like a Kubota, allow some time for the front axles, both in the draining and filling. It's a bit of a slow process...takes awhile for the bearing areas to drain out. When doing a complete service, I got in the habit of starting there at the front and allowed the axle housings to drain while I did all the rest of the machine.
(get and keep a small sample of each of the old fluids when they first start draining. Label them and put them up for future use if you have a warranty problem..if the front axle lube oil is silver colored, you need to let your salesman know, as well as the service dept where you bought it. I'd do it by email or text as well as voice and keep a copy of the text.)

Regarding all that mud......it's important to keep the area where the front axle enters the wheel hubs clean. There is a seal there, but you don't want it constantly covered in caked on dry mud. Same with where the shaft from the transmission goes into the front differential housing...common areas for foreign debris to enter.

 

[Bruce]

Thanks for the advice. Those axle drain holes do look pretty small. I have 2 "regular" oil drain pans with big screw cap tops and one open one. I can use the two on the front axel and the other for the filters. Of course I have no idea at this point if there is an easy way to get a pan under each of the 4.

 

[Bruce]

Current progress

Sadly, I can't move the piles with the FEL so I have to carry them one 16" backhoe bucket at a time up around the greenery at the NE "corner" of the pond. You can see that one of my @CntryBoy777's Tractor Supports ® is broken. I was going to claim he owes me a replacement since they have a lifetime warranty but then I read the fine print:
Lifetime warranty void if the product is used to support a tractor weighing more than 50 pounds including the operator.

I now have 50.1 hours on the engine. It is supposed to rain tomorrow. Unless I cover the tractor with a tarp and drag a work light in there, the 50 hour maintenance will have to wait. Hopefully it won't rain enough for the "pond" to overflow to the area I dug today, it is lower. You can imagine the problems that would cause.

I've seen a woodchuck on occasion, not often. But I noticed some digging activity in the upper part of the little barn so I put the trap in there with some sweet feed. Nothing for several days though the feed mostly disappeared, I'm guessing rat. Anyway, tonight I thought I should look in and make sure I hadn't trapped a rabbit (which has happened in the past). Lo and behold, there is a pissed off chuck in the trap. I'll deal with it tomorrow morning.

 

[Mike CHS]

Congratulations on catching that critter.

 

[CntryBoy777]

After all that work....ya Deserve a day off/rest, anyway....sure hope ya don't get much and it set ya back very much.......I know ya are Happy to "relocate" the rascal.....

 

[RollingAcres]

Looks like nice progress over there with the pond area. And yay on catching that chuck!

 

[Baymule]

YAY! On catching Chuckie! Now off with his head....or something like that. The pond is looking good, keep it up.

 

[Bruce]

It rained a fair bit last night. That nice hole I dug is now half filled with sludge that slumped into it. Some of it came from the "lower pond". Yeah, the one with the tadpoles in it.

 

[Baymule]

We’ll thats good for the tadpoles.

 

[CntryBoy777]

Hope it doesn't set ya back very much.....and about those tadpoles....they grow really fast so they will be jumping out of the water and hopping away, before too long..........hope ya was able to "Chuckle" today.....