Used JD4930. What to look for?

Personally, I would look for something else, but if it's a 4930 that you want, check the hydro hoses closely. They have a tendency to rub through in many places and will certainly be suspect on a machine with those kind of hours.

just overhaul all the hoses, they are single brade, make new ones with double.
you'll save downtime
check the ends they seem to crack
get a dealer to look at it. the wheel motors can't really be checked though but are expensive to fix. Check to see if it did lots of mudding.
look at spraying hours. not engine. our sprayers idles more than drives lol

w-mFarms said:

look at spraying hours. not engine. our sprayers idles more than drives lol

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Excellent point. Some sprayers spend much of their life idling or running up and down the road racking up engine hours without much wear and tear.

Thanks guys. We have plenty of nitros in our region. A few JD and some housesons but with every bit of JD gear we have they are well rounded machines. I am sick of welding my boom on my old hagie 284. Will check out the hoses.

Give the booms a look for any cracked welds. They are fairly light duty so I had to tack mine a bit on breakaways. You could check the u-joints on drive shaft coming off engine. If the cover is on it you cant see it. You could screw out a wheel hub plug and see what kind of sludge and filings oozes out. If the solution pump is wore bad they will have threaded in oversize plugs on the back of it to stop leaks.

Truth is you can see little things that indicate the kind of care it had but I have heard of the best cared for machines needing a 35000 repair.

I bought mine sight unseen from an auction cause you cant tell much anyway. Lucky so far. Never blew a hose. The case 4420 was worse for that sort of thing.

Those bearing cups on u joints are famous for not taking grease. Very spendy to replace when they let go and cause a lot of damage. Grease em and make sure they all puke out grease.

redgreen said:

Those bearing cups on u joints are famous for not taking grease. Very spendy to replace when they let go and cause a lot of damage. Grease em and make sure they all puke out grease.

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Driveshafts flying apart is a common problem with Deere sprayers but seems to more of an issue with the 4830 than the others. I know of MANY and all of them have been yoke failure. Seems that jd "engineers" thought it a good idea to weld the balance weights to the cast iron yoke rather than the shaft and this causes the yoke to fracture at the weld. I've had three such failures and know of many others. It's not nearly as common on the 47xx or 49xx though. Have never heard of a u joint failure but I'm sure it happens if not serviced like any other u joint.

Thanks guys. What repair schedule should, you consider on the wheel motors?

Rather than a "repair schedule", I'm planning to add filters on the return lines so if a wheel motor piles up, it doesn't contaminate the entire hydro system. Then just fix when fail. I haven't heard of many wheel motors failing on JD sprayers so I'm not TOO concerned but since I have to keep this sprayer for quite awhile (NO WAY I'm paying $400,000 for a new one), I am going to try to mitigate potential failures, and, in this case, try to minimize/eliminate collateral damage from a failure. I'm also going to built a skookum scatter shield for the drive shaft so when (not if) this one flies apart, it wont beat the **** out of everything around it.

Just do your self a favor and replace the driveshaft. It's only $1500. The spines on the telescope get worn and start vibrating. Have seen two break the input shaft on the front hydro. Not much fun. Other than that check boom pivots, tread adjust shims, and buy a barrel of torque guard. It will spring leaks.

Licensed to kill said:

Rather than a "repair schedule", I'm planning to add filters on the return lines so if a wheel motor piles up, it doesn't contaminate the entire hydro system. Then just fix when fail. I haven't heard of many wheel motors failing on JD sprayers so I'm not TOO concerned but since I have to keep this sprayer for quite awhile (NO WAY I'm paying $400,000 for a new one), I am going to try to mitigate potential failures, and, in this case, try to minimize/eliminate collateral damage from a failure. I'm also going to built a skookum scatter shield for the drive shaft so when (not if) this one flies apart, it wont beat the **** out of everything around it.

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Was that an oversight for factory not to put in filters or is there a flow reason that they do not have filters? I would hate to starve the pump just cause oil was restricted.

Interesting about the filters LTK. Would you let me know what size you use to handle the flow.

With regards to the line filters for the wheel motors, I still have to get the details on flow requirements and micron size that will work without creating excessive back pressure. I will post what I find out in a separate/new thread. As to whether their absence is a factory oversight, my understanding (from my brother who is a heavy duty mech) DEERE industrial equipment doesn't run return filters for the drive motors either and when one piles up, fix it and take it to the auction because it will be plagued with endless valve issues for the rest of it's life. CAT industrial equipment have had drive motor filters for years and if one piles up, change the motor and filter and you are back in business with no contamination issues with the rest of the machine.

Saw one with nearly 5000hrs on it yesterday and it looked good. They are a strong machine to put up with the high speed jolts and bumps for that period. I was quite impressed and I feel that they could get into the 10,000hr mark before the boom requires major attention. Might be a different story with the hyd though.

What sort of money are you looking at? They seem to range from 160-250k depending year and hours. I think there would plenty room to move on price at a dealer.

Would like something below 3000hrs with my 24mt unit I was doing 800hrs per year. So it would reduce to 600hrs on a 36mt unit. Have you heard anyone using JD weather on their spray units. Would love it for documentation but heard its a bit unreliable.

Interesting JD sprayers sounds like both Haeuslers and emetts the two main Deere dealers in vic would much rather sell a goldacres SP than a Deere. Sounds like fuel, cab noise and large amount of hydro issues with 4930s has them on the nose.