How many hours do Bobcats usually last?

[christiankeith90]

How many hours do most Bobcats last?

[tackit]

Andrew Camarata not happy with his. he's going to CL machines. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_Ro4MnTXe8

[christiankeith90]

Sorry I meant the welders

[Noel]

You what the problem is these days, no one reads the manual. If they did, and followed the routine of regular maintenance, longer then expected would be a good answer to the question. Most suffer from neglect and abuse.

[tackit]

Sorry I meant the welders

My mistake not yours, this is a welding website after all, .I should have known you were talking about a welding machine.

[tarry99]

They can easily go several thousand hours...........with proper maintenance.......and burning clean new fuel....I have one that has been with me for decades and now has 3057 hours on the clock.......been apart only once for de-carboning the combustion chamber and a valve job........the generator winding's were also load tested and were down just a little but well within range of what was needed to weld...........had some problems with the idle solenoid once but easily fixed................Been pretty happy with this machine.

Just an add.........I've ran my Bobcat for many days as a backup generator when power was lost here for days at about 6-7 hours a day...in fact the neighbors were all plugged into it daily just to give there refer and freezer some life.

Also used it as a CV 25 volt power source running a LN-25 Pro feeder running big wire for a friend putting up a big metal building up in the hills..........may not be the perfect machine for the job........but I have no complaints.

My 2004 service truck with 20k on the clock is now being retired and I'm looking for a 9-10ft dump body to replace the like new 9 ft Royal service body with a 13' overhead rack........If you know anyone in California looking to trade a dump body for a LN service body or that sells dump bodies.....I'm here........the truck is destined to see the rest of it's life up in the hills on a new property as a dump truck.

[Franz©]

Bottom line, Depends.
Some will argue Kohler -v- Onan, I won't.
Mine is a 1995 Onan powered Propane fueled very non cosmetic early design, and it works.
It has never run as a genset for more than 30 minutes. 3600 rpm gensets are wrecks waiting to happen.

Bob was designed to go head to head against Red in a very specific and small market. Both red and blue were good machines for the envisioned market, and both were terrible as well.
A large percentage of cooling on air cooled engines is done by the lube oil getting heat to the walls of the crankcase so the blower can shed it. If oil wasn't changed and level maintained a rod will be making a new opening in the block when you least need additional ventilation.

Both manufacturers designed & built their machine to sort of fill both needs, welder & genset, and compromised the electrical end to get all they could for the fuel burned. On a service truck for occasional use of a few hours per use with a man who religiously maintains the machine either brand will go 3000 hours with little more than fuel and spark plugs. The machine on Fred the animal's truck will be lucky to make 1000 hours.

Hourmeters are not to be trusted. Some were connected to the generator and others, 12 volt, were connected to the coil. Neither is accurate since a machine with an AC meter will run 3 hours idling and only show an hour on the meter. 12 volt meters will generally shw high hours because the machine ran out of fuel and got left switched on.

Bob definitely won't have a long life burning rods 8 solid hours a day and neither will its red cousin.

All things considered, most Bobcats go to scrap with a good generator end that will run another 4000 hours with a new engine.
If you're going to burn 5/32 or smaller 8 hours a day, buy a Trailblazer so the seperate generator can run your air compressor and hand tools.

[tackit]

Good information there Franz, I had no idea how the hour meters worked , you helped out many a member who may be wanting to buy a used machine.

[Sberry]

In the 3000 neighborhood with a couple oil changes. The new oil helps them a lot, I would be tempted.to use one of the premium synthetics. Ya, the key left on on my mower made the meter useless.
. Fwiw,, I was using multi via in the golf carts. It makes them start easy but use oil. My bud gave me a case of 30wt avation, Shell. So far I haven't added to 1, waiting to see, oil even looks different so far.

[ShieldArc]

All things considered, most Bobcats go to scrap with a good generator end that will run another 4000 hours with a new engine.
If you're going to burn 5/32 or smaller 8 hours a day, buy a Trailblazer so the seperate generator can run your air compressor and hand tools.

The new trailblazers do not have separate weld and power windings anymore.

[Aeronca41]

Is that something new in the last couple of months? Latest TB manual I found on line is from Feb of this year and it shows separate windings.

[griff01]

The new trailblazers do not have separate weld and power windings anymore.

HMMM?

An independent welder and generator power system ensures no interaction between jobsite tools and the welding arc, while advanced generator technology virtually eliminates power spikes and other electrical imperfections —

Just copied from the Miller equipment page.

Griff

[Franz©]

Based on the wiring map, presuming it's right, the machine uses a single rotating field to pump flux into 2 stationary windings, or 4 in the case of machines producing 3Ø aux power.

I'm not sure if that would be called a single generator or 2 generators. Probably couldn't say even if I knew if the producing coils were wound separately or mingled together in a single stator.

[Aeronca41]

As you say, what is different in the new one has only one field and thus only 2 brushes. The older ones had 3 brushes: common, weld, and exciter/power. I can only assume Miller figured out how to do it with one field, since they still have the "promise" Griff posted that they don't interact. I'm not a generator expert, and really can't say what design approach that would require.

[ryanjones2150]

You have to use a pixie splitter. Duh.