Hydraulic hose fittings won’t unscrew

Last time I split firewood I noticed that the hydraulic hoses were about shot. So, today I decided to unscrew them and take them to be duplicated. Great plan, but the dang hose fittings are not cooperating. I’ve hosed them down with penetrating fluid and tried my best to get them loose, but no luck. I tried heat too, with a propane torch. Maybe I didn’t heat them enough?

So, any suggestions from you old country boys as to how to get the fittings unscrewed. And I wonder if maybe hydraulic pressure in the splitter might be a factor.

Yep, sounds like the hoses have pressure on them. If the hoses are shot I bet it's time to change the hydraulic oil too. I would drain the oil from the tank and bleed the cylinder, and try again. You may need to do a little hammering on your wrenches if they still won't break loose.

Any chance they could be reverse threads?

Pressure most likely. Drain and bleed fluid off. Penetrating oil. Heat. Cheater bar. Good luck!

My thoughts

Bailing wire must be utilized at some point. It just has to.

Get a bigger hammer lol and a longer cheater pipe. Could possibly be left handed threads and pressure but when I was working heat and a 4 foot pipe wrench would usually work.

With a little inner tube for patches.

You can push the little ball on the nipple of the fitting to bleed the pressure. If the hoses are that worn out, the fittings are probably just nice and rusted. You just need to get after it with a bigger pipe or cresent wrench.

I’ll try bleeding down the pressure. I’ve soaked the fittings with penetrating oil. I have not used any bailing wire during the process. I did take some duct tape with me, just in case.

Thanks for the good suggestions, with the possible exception of the one about bailing wire.

I’ve backed off a lot of fittings with pressure on them. I doubt it’s that.

Yep, BFH time.

Some manufacture us a thread sealer that is like epoxy and hard to break loose. Heat helps. You should not have any remaining pressure on a log splitter but to be safe always uncap the reservoir lower the load and with engine dead work the valve levers back and forth. GL

Rev Dave's theory on hydraulic hoses. IF they ain't leaking, leave them be. But when one does go out, replace them all. Chances are some other catastrophic failure will pop up and you'll just trade-in or buy a new splitter before a hose fails.

Groan/grunt louder.

Then kick it and throw something.

Cheat.

I've never seen a case where reverse threads were used on anything that didn't involve a rotating component. I've also seen cases where YouTube videos were wrong in claiming reverse threads were in place. Such was the case when replacing a belt pulley on my Toyota pickup. It's always best to check both directions with safe torque before grabbing a cheater bar. I once sheered the lug bolt off an old travel trailer that had reverse threads on just one side.

Helps to hold your tongue in the right spot too

That's not cheating.

THIS is cheating!

Well it's obvious you haven't had to change a hydraulic hose before. Or loosened a nut or any fastener that is seized.

All that would not is help round things off where a wrench won't grab

Makes sense in order to keep the lawyers happy. Thanks for sharing.

Circa 1986

I yield the floor.

We have downhole tools with reverse threads that involve conductors. Three pieces. Conductor running through two. Only way to twist them together without twisting the hell out of the conductor wire is reverse threads on one end of the middle piece and its counterpart.

But, yeah, I can’t imagine why his hydraulic hoses would need reverse threads.

They make a fitting wrench that want round off your fitting .Be careful on the heat

The threads on my 30 ton splitter are standard righty tighty. It's splitting wood at the moment, but I will run back there in a little bit and shut it down to check for pressure in the cylinder. I'm pretty sure there will still be some pressure in the cylinder, but I could be wrong. My splitter is new and I haven't had to work on it yet.

What kind of pressure do those splitters put through a hose?

Get bigger wrenches. The one Bill posted is not big enough. Cheater pipes also needed.

Whoop! That’ll work!

Exam the fitting to see if this will allow you to get a wrench on fitting:

If so:
Take a hack saw to the hose and ferrule. Cut ferrule off where you can get a six point wrench on remaining part of fitting. Or use a 6 point deep socket and breaking bar. Heat the fitting up with propane. Let it cool and reheat it. Then use your six point wrench to turn it. The six point will keep from stripping the fitting off. GL

I dunno, would have to look at the book.

Relief valves are usually around 1500 to 2000 psi

Yeah, that’s not enough to keep ‘em from backing off. They’re seized up.

Tomorrow I’ll try depressuring to see if that helps. The idea of cutting off the hose and putting a box end wrench on it would likely work, but I hate to take such a drastic step until I absolutely have to. The hoses are near the end of life, if appearances mean anything, but they aren’t leaking yet.

The Speedo Splitmaster has no bleed valve that I could find, so I’ll depressure with the tractor. Maybe there’s an Allen type plug somewhere though. I’ll look again. The fittings have some Teflon tape showing, so maybe they aren’t completely frozen by rust.

This all seemed so simple...before I got started.

What kind of fitting are you dealing with? NPT, JIC, ORFS?

Danged if I know. It screws it and out (in theory).

Rule number 657 of the home repairman's guide, if there is no YouTube showing how to fix said item, there is a good chance you will make a real repairman richer.

LOL. Electrical and hydraulic components are easy to fix.

Well, sometimes hydraulics are more work, but whatever.....

Just don’t go all Phil on it. Phil is a very good friend of mine with a bad temper for gasoline powered engines. He destroyed some very expensive equipment because it would start. Funniest one was a 3 week old commercial Toro mower that he took a splitting maul too, when I arrived the engine was in the street and the frame was in the yard damn near bent in half.

One day driving down his street I found a Stihl trimmer, the one with a 6 foot shaft to reach up high, just laying in the street. It looked rough, like it had fallen off a landscape trailer. I don’t use Stihl but Phil does. I proudly presented this to him upon my arrival, his face turned beat red again and he hurled it back down the street. Never said a word about it. It’s a safe bet that it wouldn’t start

Funny!

About time to take it in.

I have some of those around here somewhere...

Sooo, has this saga ended yet? We NEED to know!

Never had a hydraulic fitting two wrenches squeezed together couldn’t handle.

X2

No, I haven’t worked on it again - yet. Was going to do it this morning, when it wasn’t going to rain. But, it’s rained twice already. I’ve got no to-do list, so I’ll get after it a bit later this morning. At least that’s the plan.

What are you using for penetrating oil? Stop by and pick up some Sea Foam Deep Creep penetrating oil. Works better than liquid wrench or WD. The only thing better, if you are close to an actual parts house is Micro Mist.

I think you should pick up some of this and call it a day. The only Irish Whiskey I like.

It’s a bit early in the day to get involved with Irish Whiskey, but I will consider it it the fittings get unscrewed. I’m a Tullamore Dew fan.

The penetrating oil I used is WD 40’s super penetrant. All I had, and it’s worked well in the past.

Sooner or later I’m gonna have to get those hoses off, or take the thing to someone who can.

Post up a picture of it if you can.

I got it done, finally. Got hyd fluid all over me when taking the old hoses off. Messy danged job. I finally had to put the big pipe wrench with a cheater bar on the fittings and do some serious grunting and straining. I filled the new hoses before attaching them, so there shouldn’t be much air in the system. And then I split some wood. It works fine.

Two new hoses cost me $144. Gee whiz...

Man, I’m glad that’s done.

Had to put all new hoses on our little dozer a few years ago, think it was $580 or so, but that was a bunch of lines.

Good job. Nothing like the nice feeling of being covered in hydraulic oil. On the bright side, at least it wasn't gear oil.

Oooof! No kiddin! Stuff stinks to high heaven!

Airo-kroil. I think thats how its spelled is the bomb for penetrant

Micro Mist is legit.

Success!

I had this same issue very recently on a hydraulic cylinder. I worked on it so hard I eventually rounded the corners on the fitting. No problem, I put a pipe wrench on it with a cheater bar. This did not end well. I twisted the fitting off flush with the cylinder housing. I had take the cylinder off the implement, purchase a Pipe Screw Extractor Set from amazon, watch several YouTube videos, said several prayers, clamped it in a vice and with the assistance of a blow torch I finally got it out. You have to be careful with the torch, if you overheat the cylinder you can damage the seals. Also forget to mention I broke my vice doing this, a vice I have had for 20 years.

So good luck.

I guess I should be happy that my problem wasn’t as bad as yours. For the record, the fittings I was dealing with weren’t corroded at all. Whoever screwed those fittings in must have been as strong as Godzilla. If I had twisted off the fitting, in the mood I was in, you’d have heard me cussing for a mile or more.

I’m just glad it’s over...

Miracles still happen.

I for one, have to say, I've missed you! 'Has absolutely nothing to do with anything you post, but I am ashamed I missed your posts in the fall.

I appreciate that Creekrunner. I come and go on the forum, read a lot, post every now and then.....but I know what you miss. I’ve thought about changing my sig but then no one would recognize or remember me.