Drivetrain wear question - Forward vs Reverse w/ Loading

[CV428]

I have had my BX2380 for 6 years and move a lot of mulch, rocks, logs, and dirt with it. Our yard is shaped weird, and the position of the house and septic make heavy equipment access to the back yard nearly impossible. I have to get all heavy deliveries on the driveway and then move bucket by bucket to the back yard (cul-de-sac lot with several acres behind my house, giant pizza slice).

I moved ~50T of dirt on Saturday, mostly in 4WD-L. Each round trip was 1/8mi, and my entire yard is a downhill slope with a few very steep areas. It took 14 hours but I got it done. I had to reverse down the hill for safety reasons (bucket forward would have resulted in a tip-over, guaranteed), and I'd return up the hill empty bucket forward. There were no safe areas to do a 180 except at the bottom of the hill. The tractor handled it effortlessly, but I may need to do this many more times to finish the build site I am working on.

It got me thinking- I don't know the exact internals of the BX2380 transmission but assume it's similar in design to other hydrostatic transmissions. Is there any additional wear in running in reverse for extended periods of time with loading? Or, high vs low gear ratio? I noticed the ultra-steep areas caused rpm overrun and NVH from engine braking (I never exceeded 3k, so don't think I was redlining the poor thing), so I had to ride the brakes down the hill in several areas.

I'm meticulous with maintenance, but I also tend to overthink and fixate on wear. I just want to make sure I'm not abusing it with bad practice...

 

[jaxs]

Avoid overloading and overrevving along with proper maintenance should give you many trouble free hours. 100 hours of use is 100 hours whether in 10 hour increments or 2 hour increments.

 

[JasonW]

50T of dirt, as in 50 Tons. 100k pounds?
As long as you keep up with maintenance, grease when needed, don’t overheat it and use clean fuel I wouldn’t worry about too much.

They will wear out eventually but it’s more of user abuse than hours/work.

 

[CV428]

50T of dirt, as in 50 Tons. 100k pounds?
As long as you keep up with maintenance, grease when needed, don’t overheat it and use clean fuel I wouldn’t worry about too much.

They will wear out eventually but it’s more of user abuse than hours/work.

Correct. It was fluffy screened dirt, so it scooped up effortlessly, and I have a piranha tooth bar. It took ~140 trips according to the notifications on my Wyze cameras. I grease every 2-3 hours of use. That FEL has done an insane amount of work in the time I have owned it. The 50T of dirt was just a lot for a single long day of work. I am starting to see a little play in the bucket tilt pin, but every other connection has no discernable play.

I wouldn't be exaggerating if I said I have moved well over 100T+ of just logs with that thing, between my property, local roads (hurricane cleanup), and tornado cleanup/volunteering from 2020. Concrete, rocks/boulders, mulch, engine blocks, you name it. I am usually careful with loading. If I start to lift and feel that the weight isn't even, or is pushing the limits, I don't do it.

As for "abuse," the only time I know I was abusing that thing was when I dug up a large hidden slab of junk concrete last year and had to tire-flip it down the hill. I never fully lifted it (there was no way that little machine could, even a mini-ex struggled to move it), so I just kept repositioning and rolling it up on end, rolling a log under it so it couldn't roll back and squish me, and then let it slam down the hill. Not the safest thing I have ever done but it worked and didn't damage anything.

Never overheated. I clean the radiator and air filter at every oil change. I have done all maintenance here, usually at shorter intervals than required.

It just felt "wrong" running the thing in reverse as long as I did on Saturday. Again, it didn't care, but I don't know if that's necessarily a bad practice.

 

[RCW]

Didn't have to move the distance you have, but I've done many, many tons of driveway stone and other "stuff" over the years.

The others gave great advice.

The way to eat a Whale/Elephant, etc, is "one bite at a time". A BX just takes smaller bites than other machines.