I purchaced a 1988 ford 655A, about 11/2 years ago with 5000 hrs. it was in rough shape and I could see that. No service manuals, tires were all bad, to much oil in crankcase no brakes would not go up a hill unless it was in low gear, it looked real bad the paint and cab was gross.the extender hoe was disconnected. Well the reason it wouldn't move is the hydraulic filter on the transmission was crushed and the trans oil was down 6 quarts. The extra oil in the crankcase was due to the oil seals in the power steering pump, easy fix.I spent about 30 hrs on it just fixing up a lot of loose and worn parts. Put on a new set of tires, big bucks fronts 400 rears 1200. new floor matt, cut out of truck bed matt. 60.00 few hoses, At $40.00 each. new upolstery, about $50.00 in materials. 2 pieces glass. $100.00. Most of the cyliners were weeping, but after sveral hours of use they all stopped. I have to asssume the machine had set for several months, and the packing were dry. Put the machine to work and it ran super. you could not get it stuck in the mud, and it was a real work horse. Now I waited for the snow to fly, and the first storm dumped 12 " in our lap. So I took it out to plow the 500' drive and after the first pass I smelled burning rubber. opended the door and the engine compartment was on fire. quickly got the fire out, but the nothing worked.. So the machine got parked we headed down South for the rest of the winter. last spring I had to pull it all apart the whole main cable harness had burnt up, under the fuel tank. Well anyway my machine had the full cab option, and ford rather than remove the old wiring fot the non cab machine, they left it hanging down under the fuel tank. The return to dig circuit wireing was in that cable area and the fuse for that was not wired right. After making all these repairs I find out they had many ,many fires. in this area . in fact there was a factory change to change over the large bukhead connector plug wireing on these machines. All in all it is a great machine, the parts are very expensive but easy to find, service manuals are still plentyfull on Ebay $99.00. In the end I decided the 655A was just too much machine for my needs and i went back to a large skid steer, and sold the machine about 6 months ago. 1988 655A are still bringing in about 14 to 16 k for clean machines, with 4x4 and ex hoes good luck, if you have any tech questions I might be able to help you out down the road.
