550 John Deere Crawler - water in oil

smile98atg · Mar 25, 2019

I have a John Deere 550 Crawler. I have been getting occasional water in the oil, usually it is not the other way around, it seems to always be water in oil, not oil in the water at least not to a noticeable level. Through a little research I am guessing it is an oring around the cylinder sleeve. I have a few questions based on that.

First, is that what it sounds like the problem is?

Can I remove and replace that sleeve without pulling the motor out of the crawler?

Is this a DIY job or do I need to take it in? We do lots of tractor and automotive work but I have never pulled a sleeve.

Should I overhaul the whole motor or just fix the leak?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Welding man · Mar 25, 2019

If you have any amount of water in the oil at all you have already fried the rod bearings and likely the mains. If the Orings are bad you likely have some cavitation also on the liners If it is a good machine tear it down and rebuild it right or pour it full of block sealer change the oil and keep running it till it dies, it won't be long. Your choice.

dzc3 · Mar 25, 2019

I recently had this happen with my Case 930CK. This is a gas motor (sleeved) with just over 2000 hrs. This tractor gets very few hours and when I drained the oil, I was rewarded with 12 OZ. of antifreeze. I put in fresh oil and filter topped off antifreeze, two days later I had 4 Oz. of antifreeze in the pan. This tractor could not be torn apart as it was needed for snow removal. I added twice the recommended amount of Dikes stop leak and 5 tubes of silver seal. After each use I drained the oil out of the engine so as to keep the contaminants as low as possible. When I refilled I took the top two gallons off the 5 gal pail and added a fresh gallon. I would used this tractor for about an hour at a time. After about 6 hours of running I no longer get antifreeze in the oil. I have to add that during this time I completely changed the oil and filter twice. May seem like overkill but thought it was cheap insurance. I still crack the drain plug before each use, and monitor the antifreeze level in the radiator. So far so good.

AJ. · Mar 25, 2019

A pint of water now and again will not have caused damage to the crank or bearings,the best way to do things is find out what is wrong before you start,I would be cautious about thinking the liner o'rings are leaking unless you had an overheating problem in the it's history,there are two o'rings that would have to fail,odds on that?,the best thing to do is before you remove anything is see if you can get the belly pan and the oil pan off,if you can get the belly pan out of the way,warm up the engine,drain the oil and take the oil pan off and with a strong light check to see if you can find coolant dripping in,you may have to pressurize the cooling system,that is the way to find an internal leak,it is possible that it can be an o'ring on a liner or a pinhole caused by a liner pitting,a freeze plug rusted or or so knowing where the leak is coming from before tearing it down is the way to go.
AJ

dzc3 · Mar 26, 2019

AJ I agree with you 100% but I could not afford to have this tractor down this winter. But now that's its spring.....

AJ. · Mar 26, 2019

Dzc3,was the Deere tractor I was referring to,now that you got yours stopped leaking I would leave it,it may never leak again,being involved in the repair business I am not supposed to do out of the can repairs but if I owned the Deere I would do the same as you done and if it held one was well ahead,if not it will not break the bank.
Good luck to both of ye
AJ

550 John Deere Crawler - water in oil

smile98atg

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Welding man

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dzc3

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AJ.

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dzc3

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AJ.

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