• Thank you for visiting HeavyEquipmentForums.com! Our objective is to provide industry professionals a place to gather to exchange questions, answers and ideas. We welcome you to register using the "Register" icon at the top of the page. We'd appreciate any help you can offer in spreading the word of our new site. The more members that join, the bigger resource for all to enjoy. Thank you!

volvo excavator tracks squeaking badly

sandcreek

Member
Joined
Apr 26, 2011
Messages
20
Location
Colorado
my excavator tracks are squeaking loud as hell. The track tension is within spec and everything seems ok.
They never squeaked until now. Would dry and dusty conditions cause squeaking?
 

uffex

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 23, 2012
Messages
4,464
Location
Lincoln UK
Occupation
Admin
Good day sand creek
A known issue root cause the grease used in assembly, you can down load reports into this issue at excatech.com its free.
Kind regards
Uffex
 

JDOFMEMI

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 3, 2007
Messages
3,074
Location
SoCal
In my experience, excavator tracks wear out from the inside, unlike a dozer, where you can see the external wear. Also, most excavator tracks are dry, not lubricated like a dozer.
The internal wear changes the pitch, as the track stretches, and alignment on the sprockets is off a bit, plus you get a lot of side to side slop as they age.

They are annoyingly load as they wear out, but I will run them to death before replacing them, unless the machine works on a lot of steep slope work where it is a safety issue if you were to break a track.
 

watglen

Senior Member
Joined
Apr 3, 2009
Messages
1,324
Location
Dunnville, Ontario, Canada
Occupation
Farmer, drainage and excavating contractor, Farm d
Mine squeak like crazy too. Only when its dry out.

We track quite a bit over mostly smooth ground. 3500 hrs and the tracks are getting pretty sloppy.
Spend a lot of time in the mud too.

What is a good estimate for the lifespan on tracks on a 25 tonne machine?
 

ddigger

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 19, 2009
Messages
567
Location
Northern California
Occupation
contractor,owner operater
On my 330l I average about 15.000 hrs per set, and I travel ALOT! During that time I seem to have to replace a front idler or 2.
 

uffex

Senior Member
Joined
Jan 23, 2012
Messages
4,464
Location
Lincoln UK
Occupation
Admin
Good day watglen
Your question can only be answered by a number of other questions - How many hours has the machine spent traveling - what was the silica content of the ground - how much traveling was confined to transport and not load and carry - at what speed was the machine used traveling.
Larger machines spend less time moving around while that of a 20 tonne machine may be used in utility operation's. Back in the mid seventies a B-D4 excavator undercarriage would on average last about 5/6000 hours however track speeds increase with the wear rate. To my knowledge most manufacturers are active downloading this information from ECU data, from what I have seen track chains can wear out as early as 2500 hours.
An analogy is that of the tyre on road going vehicle, we have carried out many in depth study's to this subject. If we can be of help please contact us at bucketsense@gmail.com
Kind regards
Uffex
 
Top