Hydraulic Cylinder Rebuild Question?

Ok, I have a John Deere 410 backhoe, all the cylinders settle on it so I bought new seals for all the cylinders a coupe years ago. I started with the outrigger cylinders and I did not have good luck at all.
There is a groove in the end of the cylinder that a snap ring goes in. When I went to put the shaft back in with the new seals, it was very tight and the snap ring groove sheered off my new seals.
I tried using grease and I rolled up flashing to put in the end of the cylinder so the seals could slide past the groove but I ended up having a piece of flashing tear off and I had to pull the cylinder back apart.
I looked up some videos and people talk about their seal kits came with a piece of plastic that fills the snap ring groove but my seal kits did not come with these?
I just had a bucket cylinder on the loader go out and I don't have the money for a shop to repair it.
I thought I'd give it a try if someone has some good advice.

Thanks for any help

Deere cylinders have a retaining wire in a groove to hold the rod wiper/seal. After removing the wire and driving the rod wiper into the cylinder, the orange plastic filler tool is used to pull the wiper out. Have you roughed up the groove edges pulling the wiper without the filler? The filler ring isn't needed to assemble the cylinder

hosspuller said:

Deere cylinders have a retaining wire in a groove to hold the rod wiper/seal. After removing the wire and driving the rod wiper into the cylinder, the orange plastic filler tool is used to pull the wiper out. Have you roughed up the groove edges pulling the wiper without the filler? The filler ring isn't needed to assemble the cylinder

Click to expand...

Getting the cylinders apart aren't a issue, I just remove the nut on the gland and then hammer the gland into the cylinder. Once the glad is slid back I can remove the locking wire (snap ring) then the gland and everything just pulls out.
I saw on YouTube that there is a locking wire or something behind the gland so they used the orange filler in the groove.

It's when I was going back together, the seals were so tight they got shaved off when I drove the cinder back together.

No damage has been done to the cylinders

Like hosspuller said, the orange plastic ring is to get the seals OUT without damaging them. They should go in fine without the ring, the ring wouldn't help anyway as it would just get pushed up the taper and jam up just as bad.

What usually happens is the wire ring raises a bur on the shoulder that it rides on. Sand or file that bur down smooth. You can also fill the groove with bondo, then scrape it out. Also, use a piston ring compressor, or aluminum can and hose clamp on top to compress the seals before installing the gland into the cylinder.

Between my Dad and me we've rebuilt many cylinders, and his John Deere 750 just whooped us both on the blade lift cylinders. First we figured we just messed up our alignment and shaved the seals , so we used the second kit for the exact same result. Come to find out on that John Deere you have to put a hose clamp on the new seals for a bit so they shrink after stretching them onto the piston. Did that with a 3rd seal and it went together easily.

The good and bad news is if your backhoe is anything like my 310B, there's a few different styles of cylinders on your machine. Im in the process of rebuilding several cylinders that are long over due. A couple were a little struggle to re-install while one required the ring compressor. So far only the stabilizers have the 'wire' ring.

I don't understand why there are a few different styles of cylinders on the same machine, seems they would standardize them. Cylinders sized for the application of course makes sense.