Mini Excavator Final Drive Motors: A Marvel of Modern Hydraulic Technology

The final drive motor on your mini excavator is truly a marvel of modern technology and works the same way whether it’s a Caterpillar, Kubota, Bobcat, or any other brand of final drive. Without getting too technical, this relatively small device is essentially divided into two halves. The first half is the hydraulic travel motor which converts hydraulic energy supplied by the main pump on your mini excavator to spin a rotating group. That rotating group engages a super strong shaft that runs through to the other half, the final drive gearbox. Using a planetary gear configuration, the final drive gearbox reduces the speed supplied to that shaft and proportionately increases the available torque to rotate the hub to which the track sprocket is mounted, which engages the tracks with tremendous torque and moves the machine in the intended direction.

It’s amazing how much power and torque these drives can produce relative to their size. Consider, for example, a John Deere 35D mini excavator, equipped with a pair of final drive motors that have a total mass weight of only 170 pounds (77 kilograms) can rapidly move that JD 35D mini excavator, which weighs 7,672 pounds (3487 kg), at speeds of up to 2.8 mph (4.5 kph). Those little final drive motors are carrying nearly 50 times (5000%!) their own weight at those speeds, and that’s sometimes up an incline, and often with the bucket full and the blade digging dirt!! That is truly a marvel of man-made engineering, and about the only thing in the natural world that comes close are worker ants, who are well-documented to carry up to 50 times their own body weight.

The good news is that with proper maintenance, your final drive motor can do all that amazing hard work for many years, as opposed to those male worker ants mentioned above who may only survive a few weeks! Because of the engineering and workmanship that goes into these final drives, they can be quite expensive to repair or replace when they reach the end of their lives, and that’s where we can help you save a ton of money and get back to work fast! In future blogs, we’ll cover topics on how to properly care for your final drive motor and maximize the life of this incredibly valuable, hard-working, and often under-appreciated and overlooked component of your workhorse mini excavator!

If you want to learn more about these how these marvels of modern technology work, or if you need help maintaining or repairing your excavator final drive motor, give MiniFinalDrives a call today!

Our family at Mini Final Drives has been providing excellent Quality, Value, and Service for over 50 years, and you can continue to count on us for a lifetime of friendly, helpful support for all your final drive and travel motor needs. Call us today at 877-483-2806 or visit our online store at www.minifinaldrives.com to find and order what you need today for Fast and Free delivery to your door.