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Yanmar mini ex?

larboc

Limestone cowboy
Joined
May 19, 2020
Member Number
237
Messages
819
Loc
Da yoop
Just went and test drive this one. No real leaks, pins have wear but quite a bit tighter than any of the junk backhoes I've used. Engine runs excellent. Meter says 1600 hrs but the replacement pins say otherwise. Looks like it could have had a breaker at one point. Everything seems to work. Has the wrong track on the left, comes with another one, half as many drive pins as it's supposed to. Ebay has a pair of new tracks for $1250. Asking $9500 with a low trailer for it.
Deal or no deal? I need to dig footers for a building and address some drainage issues.

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Have not REALLY priced them all that much, but pretty sure if you expand your budget a bit you can get a much nicer machine. That looks ridden hard and put away wet. Maybe at the $5-6.000 price point. Esp knowing it needs prob at least $2,500 in parts (the ones you know of and the ones you don't yet)
 
That's a $10k ex here but to step up yo anything even a little nicer is 15-17. If it will work for you you should be able to get your money out of it when your done.
 
Have not REALLY priced them all that much, but pretty sure if you expand your budget a bit you can get a much nicer machine. That looks ridden hard and put away wet. Maybe at the $5-6.000 price point. Esp knowing it needs prob at least $2,500 in parts (the ones you know of and the ones you don't yet)

Go price them. I've been finding machines in similar shape for 15k+. "Nice" used $25+
find me a better deal and I'll be all over it, but I haven't been.
 
Go price them. I've been finding machines in similar shape for 15k+. "Nice" used $25+
find me a better deal and I'll be all over it, but I haven't been.

From what I have seen when I have 'looked' $20k seems to be about where you get nice. $15 gets you decentish/ newerish. $10k for that is not a steal. If it was turn key ready to go maybe, but you are gonna be into it for $12-15 quickly imo.

Having done the cheap buy then rebuild, I would consider more up front next time around.
 
Yanmars are tough little excavators. I get nervous when they are painted blue, purple any odd colors as they could be grey market machines.
 
Meh, that's a small machine for that money. Where are you located? Offer them 6K and let them keep the trailer.
 
Paid $15 for a 2012 27d with 2400 hours and all maintenance records from Sunstate equipment.

I don’t think that Yanmar is all that great of a deal.
 
I think its a fair deal with the trailer depending on where you're located. I'd probably see how tight the turret bearing was and check for any blow by before I made an offer. If the turret bering is ok then offer them 8k and work from there.

I wouldn't worry about the tracks not matching. The dirt you drive on won't care.

Those Yanmar's seem to keep on running.
 
I figure if the trailer is worth at least $1000, they are asking $8500 for the machine. I might offer $8500 for everything and see what he says. I'm just not coming up with much else sub $10k, and certainly not close by.

This is closer price wise but 5k+ hrs and still on the high end of what I want to spend.
https://www.equipmenttrader.com/Cons...ZTS-5012507467
 
Made a deal for $9k with trailer. Best deal I've ever made? No, but I would have no trouble selling them for 12 in a week if I had to.
He also has a box of new metric flare hose ends for it that go with along with a spare track.

Turret bearing seemed tight. I ran the bucket out and rocked the machine up and down slightly and didn't notice much if any horizontal movement between the undercarriage and operators floor.
 
It is almost impossible to find a useable mini excavator under $15-20k around here. Some of the bigger ones are cheaper, probably because they are an expensive pain in the ass to move.
 
So I've been giving it a good once over before getting it to work. One zerk was missing and I replaced but it was for the static thumb. Greased everything, changed engine oil and filters, changed hydraulic oil still need to do filters.

Issues/questions

1) Someone has taken the covers off the final drives and tack welded them back on instead of using a wire so I can't easily pop them off to inspect. The covers are supposed to be held on by turning them while feeding a wire into a hole in the side like glands on some hydraulic cylinders. Internet says it's a fairly common way to hold them on mini ex drives of various brands, I think they might be KYB. The original drain plugs are missing and one hole had been re tapped for 3/8" NPT, the other three had a 5/8 NC set screw with a bunch of pipe tape on them. The planetaries are supposed to have 80w-90 but all I see is 00 grease when I looked in. I added an o-ring and nut to the set screw plugs and then filled them up with as much 80w-90 as I could, plugged the holes, ran the track for a few mins and repeated the filling until I couldn't get any more in. Each took about 8 oz of gear lube, I suspect they were pretty packed full of 00 grease so they didn't have much room. After setting for a few says I don't see any gear lube leaking out and the level is still where it should be. I am suspicious/hoping that the only reason they used grease is that they bugged up the OEM drain/fill holes trying to get the wire out and had to improvise plugs which wouldn't seal gear lube so they stuck their grease gun in a hole and gave'r. If there is a bad seal somewhere I think the grease is doing a good enough job keeping the oil in for now.
Regardless they seem to be working fine now, and adding gear lube can't hurt.

If they do start leaking badly, it appears china is pumping new final drives out cheap enough that I doubt I'd even mess with fixing the existing ones. Final drive with motor is $1800 on ebay, $1000 on alibaba.

2) Is there no way to grease any of the rollers or front idler? I pressurewashed the whole machine clean and couldn't find any way to lube them. I did find 3 remote mounted zerks on the house under the right foot area for swing bearing, back pin for the swing cylinder, and one for ???? but never found anything on the undercarraige aside from the tensioner zerks.

3) Cant find a free parts manual for this exact machine to see how it's put together. It has plumbing on the stick for a hydraulic thumb but I don't know how it would be controlled. The lines are capped instead of a QD. Almost all the labels are in japanese (has to be gray market), but I'm getting it figured out.
 
Figured I'd follow up.
So far so good. I flushed the final drives out with diesel then refilled with gear lube and then covered the seam between the covers and hubs with "rite stuff" and also sealed the fill/drain plugs with rite stuff and whatever threaded fastener I could find and they are holding the gear lube in great. No leaks that I can see and the fluid level isn't dropping so I think I may have lucked out for now.

This thing is SO much faster than the backhoe for doing what I need to do. I am using it to build a moat around my house for drainage and security and just loading my dump truck as I go with roots, wet dirt, and sand. In the future I will need to be a little more careful how much weight gets puts on 10R20's in soft wet sod though. I got to practice fixing ruts with the mini-ex as well.

What's the "proper" way to make a turn while walking it? I am avoiding making pivot turns as it really rips up the sod and I'm guessing isn't the best for the undercarriage. Anyone know of a good guide to good techniques?
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Most of the guys I see trying not to tear up sod, put the bucket down and lift the cab to where the tracks are only on two pivot points and the track is rounded and pivot off that. Less overall area turning sideways. I don't operate enough to know if that's the "right" way to do it.
 
Yanmar engines are good. John deere uses yanmar in all there smaller machines. Check out Andrew Camarata on YouTube dude swears by them.
 
Yanmar engines are good. John deere uses yanmar in all there smaller machines. Check out Andrew Camarata on YouTube dude swears by them.

Agreed. This makes my third yanmar in the fleet. Checked the oil tonight after about 8 hours of operation and it looks brand new. It seems like most of my diesels turn the oil pitch black within the first 30 seconds of run time.

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Like someone said, you take some weight off the front of the tracks with your bucket, then drive your tracks and pivot the house at the same time. It usually works best to put the bucket the direction you want to turn, roughly half the angle if that makes sense.
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Most of the guys I see trying not to tear up sod, put the bucket down and lift the cab to where the tracks are only on two pivot points and the track is rounded and pivot off that. Less overall area turning sideways. I don't operate enough to know if that's the "right" way to do it.

This. Lift the front of the machine, then run one track and swing your chassis in the opposite way. It helps, but nothing is going to save your grass.
 
If there is specific area that you will need to traffic you can always put something down. With big machines we use crane mats, but with a mini, some ~3/8" plywood would probably be the same :laughing: you can get 2 and basically go anywhere. You just keep moving the back to the front. Might be a little harder with a fixed thumb, but you can figure it out. Maybe a loop in the center to make it faster.
 
nice machine, i put over 100 hours on mine since i ghetto rigged the kubota engine.:lmao:

what kind of engine is in this thing.
 
It is almost impossible to find a useable mini excavator under $15-20k around here. Some of the bigger ones are cheaper, probably because they are an expensive pain in the ass to move.

this
current market, you did good even if it turns out to need a few thousand in parts
non-emissions machines are drying up, got to wonder why :rolleyes:
 
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