New Holland Tractor....Question?

[Banjo]

I bought a TL 80 w/cab back in January its about a '99 model best I can figure. I noticed that the oil was very clean looking just like it had been changed and still to this day it looks like it has just been changed. I was talking to a neighbor who has a lot newer NH and said that NH just has a really good filtering system, that is why it stays so clean looking.
I just wanted to ask some of you that have owned a NH for a while if that was accurate....about the oil and the filtering system.

[dcarp]

I have a 2001 TN75S. The oil in it looks like any other diesel engine after a few hours, black. Anything other than that I would be looking at the oil pressure to see if the oil pump is working.
Also have a TC-29 oil in it reacts the same way.

[Banjo]

I have a 2001 TN75S. The oil in it looks like any other diesel engine after a few hours, black. Anything other than that I would be looking at the oil pressure to see if the oil pump is working.
Also have a TC-29 oil in it reacts the same way.

I don't have an actual gauge like I do with the thermostat, just a dummy light that is supposed to come on if it gets low pressure or has a problem.

I asked a guy at the dealership yesterday about it and he said that the newer engines have a higher thermostat...about 200 or 205 degrees that he thinks keeps it from carbonizing, unlike the older engines that have thermostats around 160 degrees. I changed the oil in it and it was somewhat darker than it looked on the dipstick, but still not pure black.
How would you know if the oil pump is working without a realtime gauge by the way? Thanks.

[luke03cr]

Oh you would know if your oil pump stopped working because your engine would have done siezed up a long time ago. The cleanliness of the oil depends on severel factors in a diesel engine that dont pertain to your typical gassers. The main factor in darkening of diesel oil is "blow by". Diesel engines usully run double the combustion pressure of a gasser, and since diesel burns black what happens is sum of your combustion gas gets past the rings and into the engine oil. It usully takes my diesel trucks 500 miles or so to start darkening up. This leaking into your oil is enhanced by cold cumbustion temps..i.e. not getting your engine up to operating temps whenevr you use it, which is alway a great way to ensure a long lasting engine bc u burn of water that condensates in the oil and other impurities. Now the fact that u dont seem to have much of that is a indication of a engine in good mechanical shape. Also ur oil filter is a major player, i always recomend ether the good factory replacement or an aftermarket filter that filters down to severel microns.

[1wlimo]

My dad has a TL 110 and that is the same with engine oil as the older tractors in colour.

An idea, may be the oil that they had in it was some sort of expensive synthetic?

[JSCATTLE]

I run royal purple synthetic in mine and it gets just as black as any . New holland 5060 .

[melking]

Kind of sounds like a sawdust in the transmission kind of scenario.

[Banjo]

Oh you would know if your oil pump stopped working because your engine would have done siezed up a long time ago. The cleanliness of the oil depends on severel factors in a diesel engine that dont pertain to your typical gassers. The main factor in darkening of diesel oil is "blow by". Diesel engines usully run double the combustion pressure of a gasser, and since diesel burns black what happens is sum of your combustion gas gets past the rings and into the engine oil. It usully takes my diesel trucks 500 miles or so to start darkening up. This leaking into your oil is enhanced by cold cumbustion temps..i.e. not getting your engine up to operating temps whenevr you use it, which is alway a great way to ensure a long lasting engine bc u burn of water that condensates in the oil and other impurities. Now the fact that u dont seem to have much of that is a indication of a engine in good mechanical shape. Also ur oil filter is a major player, i always recomend ether the good factory replacement or an aftermarket filter that filters down to severel microns.

Thanks man......you sound like you know what you're talking about.

[dcarp]

I ran the "better filtration system" past the guys in the shop at my NH dealer. They laughed, said sounded like something one of the salesman would say not a mechanic.

Think a better question would be how many hours did the tractor have when you bought it and how many hours did you run it before you changed the oil?
Didn't mean to imply the oil pump wasn't working at all, just that possibly it had too low a pressure to mix the oil. Remote possibity since crankshaft splash would probably mix it anyway.
Engine in great shape would extend the hours it takes to change the color of the oil but after 50-100 hours a "normal" diesel engine will have black oil. I really doubt that you can find any filtration system to keep the "black" out of diesel engine oil. If you could the filter media would be so dense the wouldn't flow through it fast enough to use in a engine.

All being said, as long as the tractor runs great and you change the oil every 300 hrs(factory spec) or less and the oil isn't black all should be great. But it will turn black sooner or later just like death and taxes it's going to happen.

[Banjo]

It had about 3100 hrs on it when I bought it and after I washed the mud off of it where I had fed hay with it since Jan., I seen the oil filter had 3027 wrote on it or something close, so I have put on about a 100 hrs on it(now 3147) so I probably wouldn't have had to change it. But when I would pull the dipstick the oil looked just like honey. my neighbor said his was the same way, but he could have been guessing about the reasons why.

[Cabo]

How thick was the "honey"? Maybe full of oil treatment?

[Banjo]

How thick was the "honey"? Maybe full of oil treatment?

Not any thicker than normal that I noticed. Which by the way brings up another question \.
Do any of you use oil treatment products like Lucas oil or some of the other stuff?, I have used some but don't know if it helps or not, it sounds like it should in theory.

[luke03cr]

I HAVE USED THE OIL TREATMENT TO TAKE THE "KNOCK" OUT OF A FEW GASSERS..AND IT REALLY DOES WORK GOOD FOR THAT. NEVER USED IT IN A DIESEL, NEVER HAD A REASON TO. IF YOU CHANGE UR OIL ON A REG BASIS OR BY MANUFACTURES SPEC AND USE ANY KIND OF DECENT OIL..I PREFER ROTELLA MYSELF BUT FOR THE MOST PART THEY ARE ALL GOOD OILS, THEN YOU SHOULD BE IN GOOD SHAPE. AND THERES NO NEED TO SPEND ALL THE EXTRA MONEY ON A SYNTHETIC, MORE THEN LIKELY YOU WONT FIND IT MORE BENIFICIAL THEN CONVENTIONAL OIL.

[dcarp]

I second the Rotella. Use in all my tractors and use the synthetic in my Dodge w/Cummin.
Most used tractor has 7800+hrs, truck has 160000 miles, all run great, none of them use oil.
I keep my fingers crossed.

[luke03cr]

Im pushin 300k in my cummins, but its like anything else as long as u keep them maintained they will last a very long time. I change the oil in the truck every 6k or so with new fuel filter every other time and the tractor per factory spec, which i cant remember off top of my head . The important things in a diesel are to keep the oil and filter changed on regular basis and ur fuel filter, which helps protect your injector pump and injectors, which are very expensive when they go out