Ford 555 Backhoe (early Eighties) shuttle removal?

[iowahill]

Good job iowahill!
Your skills as a millwright are certainly evident in your project.
Thanks for the update.

Thank you!

 

[iowahill]

Happy to say that I finally got the old beast back together and running after going through a nightmarish rebuild of the shuttle, replacing all the springs for check valves and other odd bits that arose as I went through the job. This tractor sat in a field for over 10 years with water in the trans and hydraulic oil in the cooling system due to a bad radiator.

I brought it to my shop about 4 years ago as a project that I only recently was able to complete due to lack of time and/or money. New tires on the front and 11 new hoses are among the items replaced, but the motor runs strong, hydraulics are perfect (even the extend-a-hoe).

But now I have to replace the bushing and seals on the end of the dipstick. I have a bushing on the way from Amazon, but am curious as to whether or not to install the seals and the correct pin. The current bucket pins are solid and don't appear to have seen grease since Clinton was in office! Any leads on cheaper after-market parts or kits? And advice is always welcome!

After taking the bucket off and removing several of the pins it appears to me that an O-ring would suffice in place of the original pin seals to hold some of the grease in and keep dirt out as long as I periodically grease everything (as I plan to anyway). The previous owner just slammed the pins in without seals or spacers. I'm not going to be entering this in the State Fair!

 

[iowahill]

Happy to say that I finally got the old beast back together and running after going through a nightmarish rebuild of the shuttle, replacing all the springs for check valves and other odd bits that arose as I went through the job. This tractor sat in a field for over 10 years with water in the trans and hydraulic oil in the cooling system due to a bad radiator.

I brought it to my shop about 4 years ago as a project that I only recently was able to complete due to lack of time and/or money. New tires on the front and 11 new hoses are among the items replaced, but the motor runs strong, hydraulics are perfect (even the extend-a-hoe).

But now I have to replace the bushing and seals on the end of the dipstick. I have a bushing on the way from Amazon, but am curious as to whether or not to install the seals and the correct pin. The current bucket pins are solid and don't appear to have seen grease since Clinton was in office! Any leads on cheaper after-market parts or kits? And advice is always welcome!

I have the extendable dipstick on my tractor which requires TWO bushings at the bucket end. They were about $60 each from Amazon. And I found the correct replacement pin (OEM) from Joseph for about $55, compared to over $150 from elsewhere. Sadly, I got the last one in stock. Otherwise I'd have gotten two. But at least now I will be in great shape for the business end of the backhoe.

I DID find that I should/need to replace two hoses the dive deep into the upper end of the dipstick that are not going to be easy to access short of pulling the dipstick from the boom. I might be able to do it without removal and will give it a try. At least they're relatively short and will cost me around $200 for the pair. Doing the job while I still have it in my shop is the good part, much better than doing a field repair.

 

[sparky24]

I paid 500 for a reman TC direct from new holland 7 years ago, havent had any problems with it at all. My TC metal flex plate/coupler exploded and destroyed the old converter, it was all beat up and dented from flying around in the bellhousing. The flex plate/coupler cracking and breaking seems to be pretty common on these machines btw.

I bought another beater ford 555a with a trans that wont shift, the shuttle valve is jammed thats where im at with it right now, tore into it this morning taking the hood, tank, top plate shuttle access cover out. Not sure if I will have to split it or not yet - it might actually just be a jammed shuttle

Also one thing i will say about the clutches is that they are the same ones in the ford tractors that use these shuttle shifters, you can buy them for around 12 dollars a clutch plate and 4 dollars for the metal plates, the new holland prices on the clutchs/metal plates are a joke. If you search on allstateag website and match up the part numbers with the new holland ones, they cross reference over.

I dont find splitting these machines very hard, to me the most annoying part is taking the hood and tank out, once you get to that point it is just some disconnections, remove the starter, the bellhousing bolts and the flywheel bolts. I made a plate that bolts the the back of the engine to wheel the front away with another machine.

 

[iowahill]

I paid 500 for a reman TC direct from new holland 7 years ago, havent had any problems with it at all. My TC metal flex plate/coupler exploded and destroyed the old converter, it was all beat up and dented from flying around in the bellhousing. The flex plate/coupler cracking and breaking seems to be pretty common on these machines btw.

I bought another beater ford 555a with a trans that wont shift, the shuttle valve is jammed thats where im at with it right now, tore into it this morning taking the hood, tank, top plate shuttle access cover out. Not sure if I will have to split it or not yet - it might actually just be a jammed shuttle

Also one thing i will say about the clutches is that they are the same ones in the ford tractors that use these shuttle shifters, you can buy them for around 12 dollars a clutch plate and 4 dollars for the metal plates, the new holland prices on the clutchs/metal plates are a joke. If you search on allstateag website and match up the part numbers with the new holland ones, they cross reference over.

I dont find splitting these machines very hard, to me the most annoying part is taking the hood and tank out, once you get to that point it is just some disconnections, remove the starter, the bellhousing bolts and the flywheel bolts. I made a plate that bolts the the back of the engine to wheel the front away with another machine.

After going through my shuttle and replacing many parts I'm happy to report all is working perfectly now for over 4 years, being our main workhorse at my mining property. My 555 was built at the cusp in 1980 when they changed from the 12-disc clutch to the 10-disc design (Mine is the 12). Thanks to the expert guidance and knowledge offered up by members of this forum I was able to handle the job with relative ease, and a seal kit from Josephs. The most worrisome part was when I pulled the clutch disc housing and found heavy rust throughout the spline portion and half of the outer housing, caused from water that had gotten into the hydraulic system from a bad radiator and sitting in the tractor for over 10 years.

I did some online research of electrolytic rust removal, set up a large plastic tub filled with water and washing soda, hooked up my battery charger to the case and sacrificial steel scrap for a day and miraculously found all rust gone and insignificant pitting, thus saving my bacon!

Your shuttle shift problem might be broken springs on the shuttle selector at the front top of the shuttle case. There are two, one on each side and held in by the large hex fittings going into the case. If you can get access you should be able to carefully unscrew each fitting and use a small magnet to fish out the broken spring(s) and the ball bearing that is behind them. Both of mine were found to be broken and likely were when the previous owner was using it prior to final breakdown. Having the shop manual is a necessity, as well as sticking to this forum for support. Good luck, -Tom F.

 

[sparky24]

After going through my shuttle and replacing many parts I'm happy to report all is working perfectly now for over 4 years, being our main workhorse at my mining property. My 555 was built at the cusp in 1980 when they changed from the 12-disc clutch to the 10-disc design (Mine is the 12). Thanks to the expert guidance and knowledge offered up by members of this forum I was able to handle the job with relative ease, and a seal kit from Josephs. The most worrisome part was when I pulled the clutch disc housing and found heavy rust throughout the spline portion and half of the outer housing, caused from water that had gotten into the hydraulic system from a bad radiator and sitting in the tractor for over 10 years.

I did some online research of electrolytic rust removal, set up a large plastic tub filled with water and washing soda, hooked up my battery charger to the case and sacrificial steel scrap for a day and miraculously found all rust gone and insignificant pitting, thus saving my bacon!

Your shuttle shift problem might be broken springs on the shuttle selector at the front top of the shuttle case. There are two, one on each side and held in by the large hex fittings going into the case. If you can get access you should be able to carefully unscrew each fitting and use a small magnet to fish out the broken spring(s) and the ball bearing that is behind them. Both of mine were found to be broken and likely were when the previous owner was using it prior to final breakdown. Having the shop manual is a necessity, as well as sticking to this forum for support. Good luck, -Tom F.

Thanks for the information, yes I do have the manual and I agree you need it to do this job. Luckily I have already done this job before on another machine so it is still fresh in my mind, but I never had to get into the shuttle valve before. I too have not had any issues since I did this repair on my first 555a 7 years ago. I also used the hydraulic transmission pump from gulfsouthequipment (aftermarket) and have not had any issues with it.

I will continue to disassemble the shuttle area and try to find the issue on this new machine I have, it may be just what you are saying. (After looking at the manual I will likely have to split the machine to get to these detents, etc.) Oh well I am about 70% of the way there at this point anyway. Time to break it down and check everything.