Ford 4000 Slow Hydraulic Loader

After replacing rams/seals/hoses on a Ford 4000, the loader is very slow moving upwards.

There is a surging noise coming from the pump. Could the pump be the problem? And is there anything that I could try before replacing it?
 
Sorry but we're not mindreaders here.
Which 4000?
What loader?
Is it run off the onboard hyd pump or does
it have a pump run off the front if the
engine?
 
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(quoted from post at 09:29:26 10/13/17) How do I determine which Ford 4000?

The loader is a MIL Horndraulic.

I'll take some photos later.

The main difference between the two different 4000 models was that the earlier one had a 4 cylinder engine and the later one had a 3 cylinder engine. Form your pictures, yours is a later 3 cylinder model.

Also from your pictures, the loader is being run by the hydraulic pump that also runs the tractor's 3 point lift hydraulics. that pump only provides about 4.8 gpm of flow, so the loader will be pretty slow and there's not a lot you can do about that except add a front mount pump.
 
The cylinders for curling/dumping the bucket are much skinnier than the lift cylinders, so that is why they work faster than the lift cylinders. It doesn't take as much fluid volume to fill the bucket cylinders and move the piston. The lift cylinders, being a larger diameter, take more fluid volume to move the piston the same linear distance, so with the low flow of that pump the lift cylinders are noticeably slower than the bucket cylinders.
 

Thanks for the reply. The movement of the loader/bucket is quite jerky though, and the pump seems to be making a surging noise (not constant). At this point actually the loader/bucket has stopped at a particular height and wont raise any higher. That's why we changed the rams/seals/hoses as they were leaking and thought it was causing this lack of lift and speed.
 
I see it doesn't have a front mount pump. Surging is usually caused by the pump being starved for oil. Is the oil level correct? Does it have a filter or screen, as it could be plugged. The noise should be constant and somewhat quiet.
 
You need to add hydraulic oil to your system.It would be best invest in an external pump with its own source and slowly work the pistons to displace the oil. I have a Ford 2600 with a Wagner loader attached and it works very well since the early 1980s.
 
Is the 3 point lift also jerky? I am guessing that the intake screen inside the rear end is probably clogged. How well do the brakes work? The brakes are wet brakes on that tractor and they are sitting in the same fluid that the hydraulic pump uses along with the differential gears. If the brake liners have broken down, then that is likely what is clogging the intake screen. I would open up the top cover to have a look, but if the screen is clogged then you're going to have to split the tractor between the and the rear axle to remove the screen and clean it, and if it is the brakes that have broken down and are clogging the screen you are going to want to replace the brakes and thoroughly clean out the sump or it will just keep clogging the screen.
 
The pickup screen is at the end of the pickup tube which is located in the bottom of the hydraulic sump under the 3 point lift top cover. The top cover is the large metal plate that the seat mounts to and which also has the upper 3 point lift arms attached as well as that diverter valve that provides the hydraulic flow for your loader. If you don't have a service manual for the tractor, get one. From the looks of things in your picture you will probably have to remove the cab from the tractor go get the top cover off.
 
Alright thanks. Yes I have lookedd for a service manual online and printed something from a PDF (couldn't find many) and it isn't that useful.
 
I couldn't tell for sure from your pictures, but if you have clearance to remove the top cover without removing the cab first then go for it.

The I&T FO-31 is an aftermarket service manual for that tractor (and the 3 cylinder 2000 & 3000 series as well) and can be had lots of places for under $30.00. Hard copies of the original Ford Service Manual is a bit more money but they frequently come up on ebay. There are scanned versions of the Ford manual available as PDF for $10.00 or so as well. I have the I&T manual and the PDF of the Ford manual.
 
Yes, that is the proper I&T Service manual for that tractor. The did change a few things over the years, like the power steering and carb linkage, so anything in that manual that refers to "earlier" or "later" models you should always go with the section that is for the "later" models since it is a 1975 tractor.
 
Removing the cover takes a lot of oomph - they're not light! To access the filter you have to split the tractor (which would mean removing the cab). I've bought a remote filter setup from a Ford 4600 for mine and hoping I have enough clearance to cut through the old filter in situ so I don't have to split everything again...
 
(quoted from post at 14:38:13 10/20/17) Bloody hell. I would have thought that changing a filter would be a simple job.

Is it... once you split the tractor in half!! :D

Awful piece of design although if you manage to get the remote setup from a 4600 it might be possible to do without removing the cab. You might need to remove the floor which isn't a simple job either, especially if the coach bolts are the wrong size such as mine were (and thus just turned when I tried to undo them)
 
Is there anything else I can try to solve the slow/jerky loader problem before attacking this fiilter job? What about bleeding air from the hydraulic oil? And what is the best way to do that? Thanks
 

In my experience, air doesn't last that long under 4000psi, sorry.

Have a look under here:

http://forums.yesterdaystractors.com/viewtopic.php?t=1321461
 
OK thanks. Wow there's a lot to that. I'm posting here for my 75 year old non-tractor-expert dad. Not sure he's up to the job. You don't happen to live near Wiltshire by any chance do you and looking to do a filter job!? :lol:
 

Sorry. I'm in the South East. Running a loader is asking a lot of the internal hydraulics - mine runs off an engine driven auxiliary pump but had required a modification to the fuel tank to get it to fit. My rear hydraulics are still a bit jerky because the pickup strainer was collapsed from before and I haven't got round to fitting the external filter setup yet.

Plan is to rig up a hose into the breakout terminals I'll be installing next week which will allow me to pump the oil into a container to make draining easier and cleaner as trying to undo the drain plug is a pain as it has the pump feed tapped into it.

If you can get the top cover off (take the seat off, undo the pins holding the rear arms on, unscrew the 12 bolts around the outside and lift it off carefully) then you might be able to see your pickup filter and blow it a bit cleaner
 
(quoted from post at 21:03:48 10/21/17) OK, but if it can be seen and blown after removing the top cover then why can't it be replaced?

It's wrapped round the driveshaft and under the PTO shaft. To remove it you need to take the pump off and to get the pump off you need to remove the flow control valve. Fairly easy jobs in isolation but getting the floor out of the way means removing the pedals and the floor supports etc. etc.

If you can pull the PTO shaft then it might come out but mine was different to the manual and I didn't want to put too much force on it
 

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