Old JCB 2D

[George]

Can anyone who is familiar with these machines, circa 1975, please give me a bit of advice. The machine in question has been standing for a long time, however most things work but the brakes were stuck. I have freed the various levers with a spray liquid and they vaguely work now but before I start dismantling everything, where is the problem likely to be. Does it have drum brakes on the wheels and is there any form of power assistance as it seems to need a bit of help? Also when I use the rear lifts they both seem to move quite a bit, (like an inch or two) before the rear of the machine lifts. Where is the play likely to be, as an initial look round does not reveal how they are attached? I am a bit afraid that they might fall off.

I have started to try and level the site of a new shed, which will be delivered in a couple of weeks. The JCB works OK but I don't really have a clue as to how to do it. Can anyone recommend a good book or would a JCB course be the only way to learn. Is it possible - or likely to be more successful to use it like a bulldozer or scrape up the dirt using the backhoe?

Oh yes, does the steering wheel just pull off on some sort of spline, as I need to get the dashboard off to fix various problems like the (mechanical?) rev counter and the STOP cable? I undid the nut, but it is stuck and the wheel is not really strone enough to use a strong puller.

Any advice would be most welcome. A workshop manual costs an arm and a leg, I am told. Does anyone have an old one I could photocopy or buy? Thanks, George.

[Rick]

I have used a bobcat, and mini digger, with no previous experience, join both devices together, you sort of have a JCB. here is what I found.

Leveling with the backhoe is hard. To level use the bucket, make the back of the bucket vertical and drive. you can change the angle a bit, to get slightly different results. If you build up a big pile behind the bucket, stop, and clear it. Big rocks make this job more problematic as they gouge.

Using a bucket to shift packed dirt is not easy, use the backhoe.

To pack it down, just drive up and down over it.

Engine Revs, you need to have a good bit of oil running arround, so get the engine revs up, to get the oil flow. If you have too little oil flow, you will not move the arm/bucket smothly.

Hardest bits. - lowering a full bucket slowly - being neet with the backhoe.

Keep your eyes open, these machines demand much more concentration than car driving, at least untill you get really good at it. Keep people well away from you. Wear ear defenders if its at all noisy.

Dug loose ground is soft, take care when traveling over if you have dug to 2 foot, you can sink upto 1 foot into it.

When I got a pro driver in to drive the machine when the going got too tough (I had a 3 tonne machine in my sitting room), he was much more aggressive than I was, and got results much faster than I did.

Don't drive with loads up high !!!!!!!

Have fun Rick

[George]

Thanks Rick, I tried a few of your hints today. I fear the (clay) area is too wet to do any good work. The steering was almost useless and I was skating all over the place and getting stuck often too.

I am thinking about a JCB course, but the mechanical problems I mentioned are still outstanding. I think the old 3cs is a similar machine from this era. Does anyone know the answers on this - more popular machine?

Thanks George.

[Yekal]

[Andy Dingley]

Of course they are.

I have a horrible tale of a 3C which lay in a field for many years, until my father in law and I got it running again. At which point he sold it to some unsuspecting mug. Who then proceeded to try and drive the thing home.

Some time later he returned, on foot and shaking. He was plied with whiskey whilst we set off with another tractor to haul this only slightly more tattered JCB out of the hedge he'd planted it in.

I know nothing of JCB rear brakes. But from what I remember, they're a large-pad disc design (think of a typical car clutch mechanism rather than a brake). There's some degree of self-acting servo action in there, as the plates are shifted axially to apply the brakes by the action of large ball bearings moving in angled slots.

As clutches rust up and stick, owing to their large contact area and the permanent contact, then so do JCB brakes. Most noticeable though is that the self-servo action becomes unbalanced between sides. You try to apply them and one wheel locks up completely. Of couse with a JCB's skinny front wheels, you just pirouette around the back axle and the nose goes sideways....

Horrid things. I wouldn't trust one unless I'd had the brakes in bits and put them back together properly. But then I'm just like that.

[Rick]

Digging in the mud, now thats what you call a very sticky mess. I spent 450 quid on tyres for my bobcat and still can't drive over my garden when its been raining heavily.

You do get a much better job when its dry, but not so dry its like rock. The pros I have had working at my place work slower and make much more mess in the wet.

One thing sombody suggest to me was to put crushed brick down to work on, but I din't want to be left with 20 tonnes of crushed brick.

I had an *OLD* dumper with no brakes. I took the thing apart, using a bit of knowedge from cars, and got part numbers off the bits that looked broken. WHen I phoned up people to get parts, as I had the part numbers they were all very helpfull. But the parts cost more than the dumper did in the first place, so I dumped the dumper.

There is no rocket sciene in old mechanical things, no computers to screw it all up ......

Rick