Purchasing 350B crawler/loader w/backhoe attachment

[GRWeldon]

First post at this forum. Looks like I'm in for an adventure. I just looked at a 350B loader and committed to purchasing it. It is a well used unit and comes with a backhoe attachment, custom root rake, a protection enclosure and a rear ripper. The current owner says it leaks about a gallon of engine oil every two weeks. He believes it is coming from the rear main seal and says it leaks as much when sitting as it does when operating.

Although this is a diesel, I found it odd that engine sounded much like a gas engine. It started up right away. The typical knocking sound of a diesel engine didn't seem to be present. I was thinking low compression, but there was hardly any smoke when it was operating, just an occasional little whisp of black when it was under load.

It also sounded a bit like it wasn't running completely consistently, similar to a gas engine when it misses a bit, but not exactly. I was thinking this could possibly be worn injectors or injector pump issues.

I can't give exact specs on the undercarriage but the owner says it needs a new roller on the right side.

The backhoe attachment is the one with the rotary vane actuators for the boom left/right. They seem to work well and are not leaking. All cylinders on the loader and backhoe look good and do not show signs of leakage.

In order to show me the roller that needed to be replaced the owner picked the body of the crawler up about 18" with the loader and the backhoe. 90% of the hydraulic hoses have been replaced. He also demonstrated digging with the backhoe. It was not the quickest but seemed to be quite powerful. Some of the BH pins were worn and had a bit of slack. There was quite a bit of slop at the lower boom rotation pin, maybe a 1/4" or so, possibly more. It will eventually need attention, most likely sooner than later.

The machine was sitting in an area of nearly a half-acre that had been cleared with the machine in the past week, so it certainly works. He said he's selling the machine because he and his brother are going in halves on a large skid-steer that is selling for a great price. While this may be true, I imagine he's getting tired of maintenance issues and costs for a machine this old. I will be the 4th owner and the current owner knows the previous 2 owners and said the machine has lived a relatively comfortable life. It looks good with no readily-apparent repairs. The backhoe is a slightly different color of yellow, possibly indicating repainting at some time in it's life.

I intend to use the machine around the 60-acre homestead removing stumps and cut/fill duties for the ultralight aircraft runway I am constructing.

If anybody would like to advise on what I need to do to this machine before I put it in to operation, I could certainly use being pointed in the correct direction. Should be delivered on Saturday. Should I change all the hydraulic fluids and filters? Engine oil? I don't want to do a restoration, just attending to the urgent repairs and regular maintenance. The machine comes with service and parts manuals.

While you are giving me direction, you might also tell me what a machine like this should go for. I think the price agreed upon was in the correct range but I would certainly feel better to get affirmation from those who know more about these machines than I.

Much appreciated!

Glen

[77 Ford]

Welcome to the boards Glen, first and foremost I'd get to the bottom of that oil issue. I've never seen a rear main leak as much oil sitting as running. With a leak of that size forgetting to check the oil just one time and you could ruin the engine.

It would be hard for me as an amateur on the boards to price that much "extra" sounds like a real package deal.

Good luck!

[Tigerhaze]

Welcome to the board. I don't own a 350B but have looked at purchasing them before and own similar JD crawlers so can give you my $0.02.

When I first buy a new piece of equipment (whether crawler or not) I like to go though and at least inspect all the fluids for correct levels and contamination if not replace them. It is relatively cheap insurance for a machine that old. Having the service manual will help with that, so I would recommend reading it through and understanding your machine a little better first.

The engine oil leak would be a concern to me as not only would it be bad to run low on oil when operating but can make a mess of other parts and make it more difficult to maintain. I would not automatically assume the leak is where the previous owner says it is- I would give a good pressure washing underneath so you can make a better diagnosis.

The loose and sloppy pins are a chronic issue, and eventually may lead to having to weld up cracks (many older hoe models are welded up that way). I can tell you that if you bucket pins are sloppy because of worn bushings you can start breaking them and they get expensive in a hurry. I learned the hard way on my Model 50 backhoe attachment.

As for the engine condition (skipping and lack of smoke), the advice by Jdemaris in this thread about 350Bs may help you- it sounds like you may have similar symptoms:

http://www.jdcrawlers.com/messageboard/ ... light=skip

The undercarriage functions as a system; it is very unlikely that only one roller is worn without other components being worn as well. I would suggest you read this thread (within it at the bottom is a link to the IH crawler manual) to understand the system better, and I believe the service manuals describe them as well:

http://www.tractorparts.com/undercarriage.htm

BTW, is the worn roller at the rear near the sprocket? If so it is an indication of heeavy wear due to rear loading (especially if the previous owner left the hoe attachment on all the time) and so I would suspect the other rear roller to be worn as well as the sprockets. By nature crawler loaders are heavier and hard on undercarriage, and even more so with a hoe attachment.

Value depends on condition, location, and market so can't give you a value for your crawler. However in my area of the Midwest 350B crawler loaders with a hoe attachment have generally gone for between $5K and $15K depending on their condition.

Realize there is a TON of information on this site- when I bought my first crawler I spent hours doing searches for my model and reading what i could and it made a HUGE difference as I could then ask more informed and less repetitive questions. However feel free to ask if you can't find the answer you are looking for.

Good luck.

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

Much has already been covered.

Don't ignore the fuel filter. Lord knows when that was changed last! They tend to be skipped for decades, load with junk, then tear....

The backhoe tends to wreck rollers from the sprockets forward. I have seen lots of hoe equipped 350s for sale with broken rollers.

Stan

[Lavoy]

I would bet if one is broken, the others are not the best either, but rollers are readily available.
Lvaoy

[GRWeldon]

I just found out that the 350B that I'm going to buy is a 1970 model, serial number 117565.

Thanks to all who have posted so far for the information you have passed on.

The current owner has said that the backhoe tends to be a bit too heavy to drive around with all the time. I will be sure to leave it unattached when not in use.

I'm not sure how to find out what model the backhoe attachment is. Does the rotary vane actuator narrow it down to one particular model? Are they prone to fail? What then?

BTW, I'm going to be paying $7K for the package, that includes 108 miles delivery. I'm hoping that I won't need to put more than $2k more to make it serviceable.

Regarding the supposed rear main leak, the current owner said when he first got it a year ago that he washed it down real good and the leak was coming from the rear of the engine. I suppose it could be a pan gasket or a cracked pan. Don't know if that would be better or worse!

[Lavoy]

Motor swing hoes are 50, 51, 91, and 93 as far as I know.
Lavoy

[Tigerhaze]

There should be an ID plate on the lower frame of the backhoe near the valve stacks. However if it is missing you can narrow the backhoe down further as the 51 (and I believe the 95) is a "slider" hoe that has a plate that allows the center of the backhoe to slide left and right.

There are also some other tell-tale features such as the shape of the stabilizer/outrigger cylinders that can further narrow down the model. If you posted a photo up we may be able to tell for you, or you can read this thread and others like it:

http://www.jdcrawlers.com/messageboard/ ... hlight=hoe

[GRWeldon]

Thank you for the post! With the information you posted, I would think that my backhoe is a model 93. I don't yet possess the machine, it will be delivered on Sunday. I'll take some photos and post them. Thanks for your help.

[Scottyb]

Weldon, two years ago I paid 13,000 for a 350b and hoe. Soon after I saw others for sale that made me believe I had paid too much. Then, I added a winch and arch and, now I have had two+ years of logging without any issues (that were not minor), and the equipment is running reliably. So now, after all the work that has been done with that crawler, the purchase price seems like it was a value.

Get it running nice, where you can trust it to work every day. Then you know you have value.
Scott

[Stan Disbrow]

Hi,

Yup. If one is decent, then it costs more. If it is cheap, it won't be because you will stick much more money into making it decent. Somewhere on this site, there is a saga I chronicled on a buddy of mine and his cheap skid steer loader....

I was looking pretty hard for a 350C a few years back, and gave it up because they were all cheap. I knew for sure I did *not* want a cheap one. I had $20k to spend and the best I could find was $8k at the time....that needed $20k worth of work. Ugh.

My tag line is a paraphrase of Larry Niven's TANSTAAFL, There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch, modified to fit our favorite topic around here!

Stan

[GRWeldon]

I took delivery of the 350B on Sunday and had a chance to try it out. Obviously a machine that is 43 years old is going to have some issues. This one is no different.

First, I can't seem to find 1st gear. The shift pattern plate is blown out at the top allowing the shifter to escape from the containment. Unless it's supposed to be that way for some reason.

Also, the crawler doesn't move well in 3rd gear. It will barely move at first, then it will finally start moving faster and faster until at the proper speed, at which time the engine is under a good load. Don't think this should make the engine lug.

The reverser takes about two seconds to fully engage.

There is a noise coming from the rear of the engine. Since I was advised of a rear main seal that was leaking heavily, I assume that the rear main bearing is completely shot and the noise I'm hearing is the crank rattling around in the journal. Not good. I was wondering why the guy I bought it from didn't ever get above 1400RPM when he demo'd it.

I believe that at least the last two rear rollers on each side of the undercarriage need replacing.

The backhoe attachment is pretty loose and the rotary actuator does not stop where you expect it to stop. I figured there was a reason that the rotary actuator was replaced with twin cylinders on later models. I found it. The main lifting cylinder appears to need thrust bearings on each side of the pin. It moves back and forth when moving from place to place. The backhoe in general needs tightening up.

All of the hydraulic valve levers are loose. If parts are available, these should be easy to fix and should have been attended to a long time ago. If parts aren't available, I have access to a machine shop and I know how to use the equipment. I get the feeling that this will be a good thing over the course of repairs.

It does not appear that any of the gauges work except for the tach. It's hard to tell about the hour meter. It has condensation on the lens so I can't see it. I'll assume that it doesn't work as 2500 hours certainly doesn't match the machine's condition which I knew right away when considering the purchase.

On the plus side, the backhoe DOES dig and digs well. It's a little slow but that's OK with me. The cylinders leak down a bit, but again, that's OK with me as well. With a bit of TLC over time I think it will be completely suitable for what I need.

The loader works well. No leaks. It also has a really heavily-built custom root-rake that attaches to the bucket with pins. This will be very useful to me but while it's attached, it renders the bucket pretty useless for anything but root raking. As I said, for a 43 year-old machine I think it's held up remarkably well!

[Tigerhaze]

There is a noise coming from the rear of the engine. Since I was advised of a rear main seal that was leaking heavily, I assume that the rear main bearing is completely shot and the noise I'm hearing is the crank rattling around in the journal. Not good. I was wondering why the guy I bought it from didn't ever get above 1400RPM when he demo'd it.

I would not assume that it is a main bearing, unless there are other indications that the engine is running poorly. The early 350s (up through C) used a torsional isolator between the engine and reverser that is well known to rattle even when working properly and gets worse if some of the springs break or get loose. You will want to determine if that is the issue as you can do lot of damage if the isolator blows apart while running. Do a search for "isolator" and you will find a lot of threads about it.

[GRWeldon]

Just an update:

First, I can't seem to find 1st gear. The shift pattern plate is blown out at the top allowing the shifter to escape from the containment. Unless it's supposed to be that way for some reason.

I found first gear and it works. The pattern "cage" is broken at the top, or at least I assume such. Should the shifter be contained within the cage or is it free to exit at the top?

Also, the crawler doesn't move well in 3rd gear. It will barely move at first, then it will finally start moving faster and faster until at the proper speed, at which time the engine is under a good load. Don't think this should make the engine lug.

It WILL move in 3rd gear. It takes about 6 or more seconds to get up to speed and is really under load when it does move. In fourth gear it does not move at all. I'm thinking that because it is under a huge load just moving in third gear that there is a big issue with the engine. Opinions would be welcomed...

There is a noise coming from the rear of the engine.

Been advised that it might be the isolator and that is should be checked immediately. I will do that when I get a chance. Liked the thread that shows the isolator modification using a clutch disc. Might try that if repair parts can't be found or fabbed.

The backhoe attachment is pretty loose and the rotary actuator does not stop where you expect it to stop. The backhoe in general needs tightening up.

Very loose, not too quick. Does the job. I will need to make improvements to take out much of the slop. Wish I could get in touch with an expert on the rotary vane actuator and learn how to repair it.

I appreciate all the help I've received up to this point. I don't have an operator's manual but I do have the parts manual and the tech manual. How important is the operators manual to have?

[original possum]

The biggest problem you mentioned is the reverser IF it fails a pressure test. The speed of engagement is easily adjustable but if is slow because of clutch pack wear you are in for a big job. By all means, check the pressures before you use it much. If reverse does not fully disengage it loads the engine in forward and vice versa. Just a little crud in the control valve can give you symptoms, but you either need to pull the reverser or the side rail to get the valve off.