Remounting my leaking splitter valve

[Montanalocal]

My 16 T. Ramsplitter came with the valve mounted directly to the intake of the hydraulic ram with a straight piece of pipe. Thus, as many of you know, the constant jarring of cycling the valve handle back and forth eventually loosened the treads of that pipe connection and it started to leak.

After the second time of fixing it by undoing all the hydraulic lines and turning the whole valve body around to try to get one revolution to tighten up the threads, I thought I had fixed it by replacing the pipe with a union and two nipples. That would allow me to loosen the union and tighten up whichever side nipple was leaking. See the first picture.

However, the cycling of the valve handle still resulted in loosening, and I would have to several times a season get out the wrenches and tighten everything up when the leaks got too bad.

So I finally fixed it the way it should have been from the beginning. I constructed a solid mounting welded to the frame that I could fasten the valve to solidly, and then ran a new hydraulic hose to the hydraulic ram port, thus isolating the valve from it.

This is the way it should have been designed in the first place if they were not so cheap to save a few bucks. If you are doing this, the only thing to keep in mind is to move the valve slightly further away from the ram so as to allow enough room to install both hydraulic right angle connectors.

 

[fire_man]

That looks like a better than factory quality job. It's must be nice to have welding in your skill set - something I need to learn someday.

 

[Jags]

Looks like it should work well. And as a side positive it got that union out of the system...they simply arent designed for the pressures of a log splitters hydraulic system.
Just a suggestion...consider rounding the corners of your new mount. Sure as heck I would end up jabbing myself in one way or another

 

[hedge wood]

Montanalocal Nice work. I would round those corners off a little too. You have to love the bean counters that mounted those valves on the cylinders to save money. I would hate to guess how many of those valves I have moved for folks over the years when if kept breaking the pipe nipple off and spraying oil all over.

 

[Allardstan]

This thread motivated me to finally deal with my DHT 27-ton splitter that leaked constantly from the NPT union "mount." Had to take four connections off each time I made an effort to re-seal (tape, PTFE sealant, Loctite 451). Loctite worked the best but only lasted a few hours before the valve use loosened the connection. In the end I was losing 12oz of fluid every hour when collected into a can.

Pretty much did the same thing Montanlocal did. I used two 1/4" under-countertop support brackets and bolted them to the beam after drilling with a step-up bit. Can actually tighten each connection to spec since the fittings are no longer responsible for the valve position. Went with NPT to JIC with pre-fab JIC hoses. Can service each connection individually which is huge. No leaks at all now. So happy after 6 years of non-stop leaks. Figured I would share the pictures to motivate another frustrated splitter. This forum is a great resource.

 

[Isaac Carlson]

Yep, it's crazy. Many splitters are the same way.