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Hydrulic Winch fluid care and attention


mad_pete

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Looking for advice on hydrulic winch oil. I have about 30l tank with no filter currently running a PTO pump and milemarker front winch. The oil is 10 years old with very low amounts of runtime. it's lived in the garage mainly. Should I change it ? Is that drain the tank, put new in and not worry about the stuff in the winch and pump ? Is anyone running a filter and if so which one please? I'm finding it hard to find anything online that isn't built for a JCB or bigger. Ideally I'd like an in tank filter on the return.

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Our machines at work have the hydraulic oil in for life. I got rid of 2 machines this year that were 26 years old never had an oil change. They have a filter to protect the pump and valves but I would be suprised if those have been changed more than once. The only time I change them is if the housing seal goes or the machine starts complaining. It's not like in an engine where it gets contaminated by combustion.

The unique problem you have on an offroader is contamination. My machines don't get dragged through nose deep water so I would recommend inspecting it for water, mud etc regularly.

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It will only look milky if there is a lot of water in and you circulate it to mix it up, water will separate out and settle at the bottom of the tank, if just a small amount it will be in little "globules".

You really should fit a return line filter, but bear in mind most comtamination is put in by the bloke topping up the tank or changing hoses if you have a nice clean non leaky system it should stay clean.

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