Cylinder Rod Protection and General Between-Use Care

[Nicksacco]

So I was thinking about those of us that might not use our tractors daily - and especially over the Winter.
In particular, I was thinking about protecting the cylinder rods from damage from rust, pitting and whatever.
I've found a couple of ideas from articles like the one below, but was curious what you all are doing.
My tractor has a home, so it's out of the weather when not being used.
For critter protection, I shove some stainless wool in the exhaust and block the intake to keep out the critters.
Of course there's sprays for that too.

It seems that the easiest thing for rods is just to spray them with some WD40 to displace moisture.
I doubt WD40 would hurt the wipers, but does anyone have experience they'd like to share?

How To Protect Hydraulic Cylinder Rods From Long-Term Exposure To the Atmosphere | Brendan Casey's hydraulics blog

Trusted Hydraulic Cylinder & Hose Protection | Seal Saver

For more than 30 years, companies have trusted Seal Saver to provide unwavering protection for their hydraulic cylinders and hoses. Our custom solutions protect your equipment from dirt, corrosion, grit and more. Contact us today to start your quote.

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Sewn Bellows | Rod Boots & Way Covers - Dynatect

GORTITE sewn bellows are manufactured from heavy-duty elastomer-coated fabric sewn. Available in many shapes & sizes.

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[GreensvilleJay]

retract the rods inside the cylinders, spray some 'rustchek' on the rest.

 

[mcfarmall]

I remove my hydraulic cylinder, crossover relief, and hoses from my scraper blade as an assembly and store indoors during the off season. 2 bolts and 2 pins and everything is off.

 

[TheOldHokie]

So I was thinking about those of us that might not use our tractors daily - and especially over the Winter.
In particular, I was thinking about protecting the cylinder rods from damage from rust, pitting and whatever.
I've found a couple of ideas from articles like the one below, but was curious what you all are doing.
My tractor has a home, so it's out of the weather when not being used.
For critter protection, I shove some stainless wool in the exhaust and block the intake to keep out the critters.
Of course there's sprays for that too.

It seems that the easiest thing for rods is just to spray them with some WD40 to displace moisture.
I doubt WD40 would hurt the wipers, but does anyone have experience they'd like to share?

How To Protect Hydraulic Cylinder Rods From Long-Term Exposure To the Atmosphere | Brendan Casey's hydraulics blog

Trusted Hydraulic Cylinder & Hose Protection | Seal Saver

For more than 30 years, companies have trusted Seal Saver to provide unwavering protection for their hydraulic cylinders and hoses. Our custom solutions protect your equipment from dirt, corrosion, grit and more. Contact us today to start your quote.

www.sealsaver.com

Sewn Bellows | Rod Boots & Way Covers - Dynatect

GORTITE sewn bellows are manufactured from heavy-duty elastomer-coated fabric sewn. Available in many shapes & sizes.

dynatect.com

I have cylinders that have been stored outside in the weatther for 30 years and zero problem with rust on any rods.

Dan

 

[Lil Foot]

Back when I rebuilt my backhoe, one of the swing cylinder rams was badly nicked, so I took it in to our local rebuild/repair guy. They turned it down .030, copper plated it .007-.008 thk, (for adhesion) then chrome plated it .030-.035 thk. Then it was re-ground to original size.
They told me that old school rams were almost all .030 thk chrome plated, and most new ones (china) are as little as .003 thk chrome. That is why quality, old rams could sit out in the weather for decades, and newer ones show rust spots pretty quickly.

 

[D2Cat]

I am curious, since I do not do any protection for any cyl rams for non use, do folks take care of their own bodies with the same intensity?

 

[TheOldHokie]

I am curious, since I do not do any protection for any cyl rams for non use, do folks take care of their own bodies with the same intensity?

Yeah - I only allow myself 3 cinnamon rolls and 3 cups of coffeee per day. No hard limit on beer.

Dan

 

[McMXi]

So I was thinking about those of us that might not use our tractors daily - and especially over the Winter.
In particular, I was thinking about protecting the cylinder rods from damage from rust, pitting and whatever.
I've found a couple of ideas from articles like the one below, but was curious what you all are doing.
My tractor has a home, so it's out of the weather when not being used.
For critter protection, I shove some stainless wool in the exhaust and block the intake to keep out the critters.
Of course there's sprays for that too.

It seems that the easiest thing for rods is just to spray them with some WD40 to displace moisture.
I doubt WD40 would hurt the wipers, but does anyone have experience they'd like to share?

How To Protect Hydraulic Cylinder Rods From Long-Term Exposure To the Atmosphere | Brendan Casey's hydraulics blog

Trusted Hydraulic Cylinder & Hose Protection | Seal Saver

For more than 30 years, companies have trusted Seal Saver to provide unwavering protection for their hydraulic cylinders and hoses. Our custom solutions protect your equipment from dirt, corrosion, grit and more. Contact us today to start your quote.

www.sealsaver.com

Sewn Bellows | Rod Boots & Way Covers - Dynatect

GORTITE sewn bellows are manufactured from heavy-duty elastomer-coated fabric sewn. Available in many shapes & sizes.

dynatect.com

I have a Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering and my thesis involved the study of corrosion mechanisms of metal matrix composites, but I also did a lot of corrosion testing for various branches of the armed forces. Some of that testing involved identifying good alternatives for corrosion mitigation of circuit boards, automotive parts, firearms parts, tank parts, aircraft parts etc.

One of the best products we found that would do an amazing job of protecting carbon steel in a chloride rich and humid environment was Tri-Flow. WD-40 was next to useless in this role. The standard experiment was to clean and weigh plain carbon steel coupons, dip them in various products, hang them so that excess product would run off, then hang them in a 3.15% NaCl (seawater) salt spray chamber where the relative humidly was maintained at 75% or greater. After 3, 6 and 12 month exposures we'd clean various coupons using acids intended to remove corrosion products but not base metal, and weigh them to determine mass loss. Tri-Flow repeatedly excelled in this application beating many products that were marketed for corrosion protection.

We had corrosion test sites all over the Hawaiian islands and one at the volcano on the Big Island. Nothing metal did well out there and initially we were losing instrumentation on a regular basis due to corrosion. Once I started spraying the circuit boards each year with Tri-Flow we never lost a single one after that.

Short version: Tri-Flow sprayed on exposed rams works really well to mitigate corrosion due to chlorides or sulphates. That's what I use.

 

[Henro]

I have a Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering and my thesis involved the study of corrosion mechanisms of metal matrix composites, but I also did a lot of corrosion testing for various branches of the armed forces. Some of that testing involved identifying good alternatives for corrosion mitigation of circuit boards, automotive parts, firearms parts, tank parts, aircraft parts etc.

One of the best products we found that would do an amazing job of protecting carbon steel in a chloride rich and humid environment was Tri-Flow. WD-40 was next to useless in this role. The standard experiment was to clean and weigh plain carbon steel coupons, dip them in various products, hang them so that excess product would run off, then hang them in a 3.15% NaCl (seawater) salt spray chamber where the relative humidly was maintained at 75% or greater. After 3, 6 and 12 month exposures we'd clean various coupons using acids intended to remove corrosion products but not base metal, and weigh them to determine mass loss. Tri-Flow repeatedly excelled in this application beating many products that were marketed for corrosion protection.

We had corrosion test sites all over the Hawaiian islands and one at the volcano on the Big Island. Nothing metal did well out there and initially we were losing instrumentation on a regular basis due to corrosion. Once I started spraying the circuit boards each year with Tri-Flow we never lost a single one after that.

Short version: Tri-Flow sprayed on exposed rams works really well to mitigate corrosion due to chlorides or sulphates. That's what I use.

My understanding is that cylinder rods are hard chrome plated and that chrome does not rust.

There used to be and old track loader/bulldozer (forget which), in a field nearby that sat there for decades. It was a rust bucket, but the cylinder rods were like-new shiny when viewed from the road driving by. Always impressed me.

Worrying about cylinder rods rusting is not a priority for me. Not sure about corrosion due to chlorides or sulfates though. No a concern for me as there are none around my tractors.

 

[McMXi]

My understanding is that cylinder rods are hard chrome plated and that chrome does not rust.

There used to be and old track loader/bulldozer (forget which), in a field nearby that sat there for decades. It was a rust bucket, but the cylinder rods were like-new shiny when viewed from the road driving by. Always impressed me.

Worrying about cylinder rods rusting is not a priority for me. Not sure about corrosion due to chlorides or sulfates though. No a concern for me as there are none around my tractors.

There are lots of variables an obviously the environment is a big part of that. As for chrome rusting, it doesn't of course, but how pure is the chrome plating, how thick is it, are there tiny voids in the plating, are there impurities in the plating that form a galvanic couple that lead to pitting, has the chrome plating worn through enough to expose the steel beneath etc? We've all seen rusted chrome bumpers and rusted cylinder rods so we know it can happen.

Kubota recommends retracting the cylinder rods for storage so obviously they know that corrosion is possible regardless of the chrome plating. I'm just trying to pass on some corrosion related knowledge that I accumulated over 10 years of working as a research engineer in a lab and in the field. I'm not trying to start an argument over will it or won't it. If you don't have a corrosion concern then that's a good thing.

 

[RCW]

I am curious, since I do not do any protection for any cyl rams for non use, do folks take care of their own bodies with the same intensity?

I've got an almost 70 year old 'Moline with one original cylinder and other is used, but same era.

Tractor was outside for decades. Only been under a cover last few.

Have some minor blemishes, but otherwise A-Okie-Dokie. No leaks.

Always kept retracted.

The hoses, on the other hand.....

 

[TheOldHokie]

My understanding is that cylinder rods are hard chrome plated and that chrome does not rust.

There used to be and old track loader/bulldozer (forget which), in a field nearby that sat there for decades. It was a rust bucket, but the cylinder rods were like-new shiny when viewed from the road driving by. Always impressed me.

Worrying about cylinder rods rusting is not a priority for me. Not sure about corrosion due to chlorides or sulfates though. No a concern for me as there are none around my tractors.

Bingo. Not all rods are plated but the vast majority of modern mobil equipment uses induction hardened rods with chrome plating. Yes the plating on modern rods (domestic and import) is 5-8 mil thick but it doesn"'t really matter - they still don't rust. There are hundreds of thousands of pieces of construction equipment sitting in the weather with the rods exposed and its simply not an issue for them.

Dan

 

[kubotafreak]

mcmxi,

Got a part number? Im always up for good product.

 

[Elliott in GA]

Tri-Flow has been a very popular bicycle chain lube for decades; it works very well.

You could also use a product like Corrosion X (popular with boaters); it can be used on any surface including electrical boards. There are some more effective marine products, but they make more of a mess than their extra value warrants.

Whether or where you need to use these products is up to you. In any event, both are cheap.

 

[fried1765]

I have a Master's degree in Mechanical Engineering and my thesis involved the study of corrosion mechanisms of metal matrix composites, but I also did a lot of corrosion testing for various branches of the armed forces. Some of that testing involved identifying good alternatives for corrosion mitigation of circuit boards, automotive parts, firearms parts, tank parts, aircraft parts etc.

One of the best products we found that would do an amazing job of protecting carbon steel in a chloride rich and humid environment was Tri-Flow. WD-40 was next to useless in this role. The standard experiment was to clean and weigh plain carbon steel coupons, dip them in various products, hang them so that excess product would run off, then hang them in a 3.15% NaCl (seawater) salt spray chamber where the relative humidly was maintained at 75% or greater. After 3, 6 and 12 month exposures we'd clean various coupons using acids intended to remove corrosion products but not base metal, and weigh them to determine mass loss. Tri-Flow repeatedly excelled in this application beating many products that were marketed for corrosion protection.

We had corrosion test sites all over the Hawaiian islands and one at the volcano on the Big Island. Nothing metal did well out there and initially we were losing instrumentation on a regular basis due to corrosion. Once I started spraying the circuit boards each year with Tri-Flow we never lost a single one after that.

Short version: Tri-Flow sprayed on exposed rams works really well to mitigate corrosion due to chlorides or sulphates. That's what I use.

I have been using Tri-Flow for corrosion protection for many years, and LPS-3 as well.
Very old - Civil engineer,...no MS.

 

[Nicksacco]

Good discussion with a lot of experience and information.

Here are the products mentioned. Please advise if not correct.

RUSTCHEK

TRI-FLOW

LPS-3

CORROSION X

 

[RichardAaronlx2610]

At the company i work for we have over 40 pieces of vintage equipment with exposed rods sitting in our yard, almost all of them haven’t moved in 30+ years, I can Only name one crane with rusty cylinders and that’s because it has nicks on it. Other than that i personally Have never Ever seen one rust. Now seals blowing out? That’s a whole different story lol

 

[McMXi]

I have been using Tri-Flow for corrosion protection for many years, and LPS-3 as well.
Very old - Civil engineer,...no MS.

We used a lot of LPS products in my previous career as a commercial diver and welder. Thick, goopy stuff for sure, but when you're on a tug boat for 14 days chasing a Chinese freighter that's taking on water, and you have compressors, welders, tool boxes and such stashed on the deck you spray the crap out of everything with the most durable stuff you can find. And then the Chinese crane operator trashes just about every piece of equipment you've been looking after as he attempts to get it on board the freighter! Good times .... not!!

 

[McMXi]

mcmxi,

Got a part number? Im always up for good product.

I buy both of these for firearms, automotive, tractors etc. We tested the bottle variant when I worked in the corrosion lab.

TRI-FLOW SUPERIOR LUBRICANT AEROSOL - Triflow Lubricants

www.triflowlubricants.com

TRI-FLOW® SUPERIOR LUBRICANT DRIP BOTTLE - Triflow Lubricants

www.triflowlubricants.com

 

[McMXi]

There are hundreds of thousands of pieces of construction equipment sitting in the weather with the rods exposed and its simply not an issue for them.

Dan

There are so many variables at play though such as where is the equipment located, how well are the rods plated, how is it maintained, how often is it used etc.? Any coastal area with high humidity can wreak havoc on metal parts, even chrome plated metal parts. Up here in NW Montana where the humidity is low, chlorides are non-existent and it rarely rains, corrosion is much less of an issue.

There are numerous articles, forum posts and photos regarding the corrosion of hydraulic piston rods, for example.

A Quick Guide to Hydraulic Cylinder Pitting and Repair Options

Hydraulic cylinder piston rods can experience pitting. Discover more about this condition, as well as prevention and repair options.

www.quadfluiddynamics.com