I can't seem to find the thread that had this conversation in before so I'll ask again with it specifically listed in the title.
Sorry for asking this question again, but I finally bought a used backhoe and now wanting to buy or might end up building a quick attach for the bucket on the hoe itself. I ended up getting a very low hour late model Komatsu WB 140 with all the bells and whistles on it but a quick attach.
Either I'm asking the wrong questions to the sales people or they flat out don't want to sell me what I'm wanting for some reason, or maybes its not even made anymore. I've looked at quite a few quick attaches on other machines from large excavators to mini's to backhoes and everything in between. I own an excavator with a hydraulic coupler on it, works great, the hoses and swivels are a different story, and nothing but problems along with the wiring and everything else it takes to make the coupler work like it should. So this time around I'm wanting basic and simple, just a pin grabber style, and just put a pin back in to hold the bucket in place, one pin to remove and put back in and leave one pin each attachment. I've been told in the past cat makes one for their backhoes, case has used a simple setup for decades, used it myself many times on friends and customers machines, but Komatsu apparently doesn't make one for theirs.
All anyone wants to sell me is a mechanical pin grabber set up that uses either a bar, or over centering spring setup or a lead screw draw bolt type deal, which might work great if you use it multiple times per day in nice weather. I work in the slop and mud all winter long and none of those couplers will ever work for me when I'd need them, they'd be frozen solid and completely useless for my needs the bulk of the time, can't seem to get anyone to understand that for some reason. The same issue we have with the hydraulic coupler on one of my excavators now, basically that doesn't change attachments or buckets unless you put it in a shop overnight to thaw everything out first. So all winter long, it has the same bucket on it till spring arrives basically.
The next issue is the bucket itself, the one's that came with the machine are too small and are completely worthless to me. What company makes a good quality bucket that might not take a six months to a couple years to get one from. I'm only needing a simple 24 inch toothed bucket and another smooth bucket.
Now I'll admit, after all the thousands of hours I've ran machines, I've never really paid that much attention to the buckets like I should have, I guess they work and stuff comes out of them until freezing weather hits and then nothing sloppy, mucky or a bit sticky comes out and after a short time you have a frozen mass of stuff and the machine or bucket needs to head somewhere warm to thaw back out so you can actually dump the stuff out again to have a bucket to use again. The heavy duty buckets that came with the machine, I've figured out have straight sides, meaning the front opening and back width are the same and nothing will come out of them..............ever without banging the bucket to death each and every time you scoop something up with them, all the rest of my buckets on everything have a tapered back so to speak meaning they are narrower in the back of the bucket verses the front. Well long story short, how much taper should a bucket have in order to get stuff to drop out of the bucket, is there an industry standard to follow somewhere I haven't found. I've asked some sales people and all I get is a standard response, its a backhoe bucket, measure the width and do you want teeth or a smooth edge end of discussion....................place your order and maybe next summer sometime if your lucky, you MIGHT have it, but in all reality, might be the following summer.
Sorry for asking this question again, but I finally bought a used backhoe and now wanting to buy or might end up building a quick attach for the bucket on the hoe itself. I ended up getting a very low hour late model Komatsu WB 140 with all the bells and whistles on it but a quick attach.
Either I'm asking the wrong questions to the sales people or they flat out don't want to sell me what I'm wanting for some reason, or maybes its not even made anymore. I've looked at quite a few quick attaches on other machines from large excavators to mini's to backhoes and everything in between. I own an excavator with a hydraulic coupler on it, works great, the hoses and swivels are a different story, and nothing but problems along with the wiring and everything else it takes to make the coupler work like it should. So this time around I'm wanting basic and simple, just a pin grabber style, and just put a pin back in to hold the bucket in place, one pin to remove and put back in and leave one pin each attachment. I've been told in the past cat makes one for their backhoes, case has used a simple setup for decades, used it myself many times on friends and customers machines, but Komatsu apparently doesn't make one for theirs.
All anyone wants to sell me is a mechanical pin grabber set up that uses either a bar, or over centering spring setup or a lead screw draw bolt type deal, which might work great if you use it multiple times per day in nice weather. I work in the slop and mud all winter long and none of those couplers will ever work for me when I'd need them, they'd be frozen solid and completely useless for my needs the bulk of the time, can't seem to get anyone to understand that for some reason. The same issue we have with the hydraulic coupler on one of my excavators now, basically that doesn't change attachments or buckets unless you put it in a shop overnight to thaw everything out first. So all winter long, it has the same bucket on it till spring arrives basically.
The next issue is the bucket itself, the one's that came with the machine are too small and are completely worthless to me. What company makes a good quality bucket that might not take a six months to a couple years to get one from. I'm only needing a simple 24 inch toothed bucket and another smooth bucket.
Now I'll admit, after all the thousands of hours I've ran machines, I've never really paid that much attention to the buckets like I should have, I guess they work and stuff comes out of them until freezing weather hits and then nothing sloppy, mucky or a bit sticky comes out and after a short time you have a frozen mass of stuff and the machine or bucket needs to head somewhere warm to thaw back out so you can actually dump the stuff out again to have a bucket to use again. The heavy duty buckets that came with the machine, I've figured out have straight sides, meaning the front opening and back width are the same and nothing will come out of them..............ever without banging the bucket to death each and every time you scoop something up with them, all the rest of my buckets on everything have a tapered back so to speak meaning they are narrower in the back of the bucket verses the front. Well long story short, how much taper should a bucket have in order to get stuff to drop out of the bucket, is there an industry standard to follow somewhere I haven't found. I've asked some sales people and all I get is a standard response, its a backhoe bucket, measure the width and do you want teeth or a smooth edge end of discussion....................place your order and maybe next summer sometime if your lucky, you MIGHT have it, but in all reality, might be the following summer.