Hello everyone,
I was helping out a friend today digging a pad for a shed and doing some rough landshaping and was operating a borrowed Kubota KX151. The digging wasn't the easiest but definitely not pushing the machine too hard either... A little background on the thing - it went through the flood last June and water was up to the top of the engine enclosure. The owner got it running again and apparently flushed all the fluids and such. None of the electrical works except for the starter and the charging system, but there are no gauges, no warning lights, nothing. After about 2 hours or so, I heard a muffled BOOM and felt something coming from the engine compartment, then there was a huge white cloud coming from the engine area. I shut the machine down and bailed out thinking the battery had blown up from the BOOM I heard. After the cloud dissipated some my friend and I opened the engine room door and discovered the top radiator hose had literally exploded right down the middle all the way down from top to bottom. The only thing holding the ends together were the hose clamps. I've never seen a radiator hose fail in this way! We figured it was just old, bought a new one, installed it, filled it with antifreeze mix and went back to work thinking that the problem was dealt with. Another 2 hours or so later all of a sudden a new cloud of steam, this time coming out the overflow tank vent line. Shut 'er down again and let it vent it's steam off, took a good 15 minutes before it stopped! Now we're not so sure where the problem may be. The radiator appears to be clean, the owner had given the machine a good bath after the flood. I'm not sure how clean it is inside but from what we could see down the filler cap it didn't look bad. My friend is going to take the thermostat out tomorrow and make sure it works, we're just wondering what other causes there could be. He seems to think the water pump is working as you can see fluid moving around in the rad with the engine running, so that should also rule out the thermostat but he's going to check it anyway. Are there any common problems with these machines that cause overheating? Any hints and help would be appreciated!
Thanks! And here's some pictures of the work we were doing and the popped hose...
I was helping out a friend today digging a pad for a shed and doing some rough landshaping and was operating a borrowed Kubota KX151. The digging wasn't the easiest but definitely not pushing the machine too hard either... A little background on the thing - it went through the flood last June and water was up to the top of the engine enclosure. The owner got it running again and apparently flushed all the fluids and such. None of the electrical works except for the starter and the charging system, but there are no gauges, no warning lights, nothing. After about 2 hours or so, I heard a muffled BOOM and felt something coming from the engine compartment, then there was a huge white cloud coming from the engine area. I shut the machine down and bailed out thinking the battery had blown up from the BOOM I heard. After the cloud dissipated some my friend and I opened the engine room door and discovered the top radiator hose had literally exploded right down the middle all the way down from top to bottom. The only thing holding the ends together were the hose clamps. I've never seen a radiator hose fail in this way! We figured it was just old, bought a new one, installed it, filled it with antifreeze mix and went back to work thinking that the problem was dealt with. Another 2 hours or so later all of a sudden a new cloud of steam, this time coming out the overflow tank vent line. Shut 'er down again and let it vent it's steam off, took a good 15 minutes before it stopped! Now we're not so sure where the problem may be. The radiator appears to be clean, the owner had given the machine a good bath after the flood. I'm not sure how clean it is inside but from what we could see down the filler cap it didn't look bad. My friend is going to take the thermostat out tomorrow and make sure it works, we're just wondering what other causes there could be. He seems to think the water pump is working as you can see fluid moving around in the rad with the engine running, so that should also rule out the thermostat but he's going to check it anyway. Are there any common problems with these machines that cause overheating? Any hints and help would be appreciated!
Thanks! And here's some pictures of the work we were doing and the popped hose...