Finally singing the B3350 regen blues.

[lescarpentier]

Well it finally happened.My 4th parked regen at 280.1 hours resulted in a failure.As always the tractor runs great but after 3 tries this 4th regen will not complete and results in the warning indicator illuminating instead of completing.Personally I have no way to haul my tractor and the dealer can't pick it up any earlier than this coming Monday.The timing is bad as the rains are due and most of my work is done in a swamp.In spite of running at or near full throttle my regens have always been too frequent averaging roughly 7 hour intervals,often more frequently.The 3 successful parked regens,curiously occurred in very close to 70 hour intervals went off without a hitch.I bought the WSM soon after I bought the tractor but other than showing how the regeneration process is supposed to work,which doesn't correlate to my real life experiences,there is no trouble shooting section for DPF problems.When the warning light is illuminated I should be hearing the buzzer every 3 seconds or in the worst case 1 second intervals,however the buzzer is going off every 5 seconds.A note for the B3350 owners,you can't rely on what the manual says and there is a lot of bad,incorrect information out there,including the fallacy,or lie,that newer tractors use the same amount of fuel running the tractor wide open as they do at lower RPMs.This is flat out BS!I use roughly 25% more fuel at 2500 RPMs vs 2000.It could be more.Also,if you are bragging about how well your 3350 works with 50 or even 150 hours you may wish to refrain from this until you have some real hours on your tractor. I considered myself lucky compared to others who's tractors would not run at all,but at 280 hours the roof has finally fallen in.I am not posting this for advice,rather I felt that sharing my experiences and the outcome may prove useful to somebody.I will post again when I have something new to share.This may be interesting.

Bob

 

[Myb3350]

I feel for you friend, B3350 owner here so far my tractor has been flawless, but i am expecting problems anytime, my tractor has 145 hours and had performed great. I do live in a warm climate and run full throttle when possible, but I am expecting to have problems, and when I do I will be PO at Kubota.

 

[tempforce]

I feel your pain. my 3350 was one of them that never did work properly. it took Kubota a year before deciding to buy it back at just under 100 hours... most of those hours were when the tractor was at the dealers repair shop. after replacing everything including the kitchen sink. they gave up trying to fix it... I own a b2650. I miss the higher rpm when mowing. as the mower likes a high rpm for clean cuts... and it takes longer to do work, due to lower hp. but it keeps running with no issues.. I now have over 200 hrs on my b2650 and it's not yet a year old...
good luck, hopefully it's just a simple fix...

 

[lescarpentier]

I feel for you friend, B3350 owner here so far my tractor has been flawless, but i am expecting problems anytime, my tractor has 145 hours and had performed great. I do live in a warm climate and run full throttle when possible, but I am expecting to have problems, and when I do I will be PO at Kubota.

You've had much longer intervals between regens than I ever did and I think the engine load has much to do with it.You brush hog a lot which I'm sure must load the engine significantly,producing higher exhaust temperatures in addition to the warm climate.I have a backhoe and loader. The backhoe puts almost no load on the engine and neither does the loader.I run mine full throttle whenever I can but I think a significant load on my engine would have really helped extend the regen intervals.Hopefully you won't have any serious problems before this gets figured out.Good luck!

I feel your pain. my 3350 was one of them that never did work properly. it took Kubota a year before deciding to buy it back at just under 100 hours... most of those hours were when the tractor was at the dealers repair shop. after replacing everything including the kitchen sink. they gave up trying to fix it... I own a b2650. I miss the higher rpm when mowing. as the mower likes a high rpm for clean cuts... and it takes longer to do work, due to lower hp. but it keeps running with no issues.. I now have over 200 hrs on my b2650 and it's not yet a year old...
good luck, hopefully it's just a simple fix...

I read your posts regarding your troubles and I felt for you too.Your handle (tempforce) is almost synonymous with B3350 blues.I felt that you were treated very unfairly.Tractor House is full of low hour B3350s and nothing but new B2650s and no complaints about them.I had already read bad reports about the B3350 so I knew better. I made the decision to get the B2650 until I learned that the optional larger tires were only available on the B3350 and I knew that I needed the extra flotation.I only paid $1,000 more for the B3350 but in retrospect I should have bought the B2650 and took the saved money to another dealer and bought the larger tires and use them for all of my swamp work but this isn't the only time I cast my vote for the long shot.I trust that your tractor will serve you well for years!

 

[lescarpentier]

I spoke with the mechanic who is working on my tractor today and he told me that he had to order a new reformer.My serial number is above 60,000 which apparently means that my tractor has all of the updated parts and shouldn't have needed anything.It is true that I was,in spite of the frequent regens,able to clock 280 hours without any breakdowns but this isn't the kind of longevity I was looking for.Messicks list the reformer for something like $1895.00 and they only sell them as a component so they are not at this time rebuildable.It is a pretty small part and shouldn't be worth more that 2 or 300 bucks! So,judging by my experience the lifespan of their improved reformer is 280 hours.That is roughly $6.75 an hour.Thank goodness I am still under warranty but that won't last forever.The DPF muffler is also non rebuildable and with the sensors attached sells for over $3,000.00 and has a projected lifespan of 3,000 hours.

 

[mckenzie913]

I spoke with the mechanic who is working on my tractor today and he told me that he had to order a new reformer.My serial number is above 60,000 which apparently means that my tractor has all of the updated parts and shouldn't have needed anything.It is true that I was,in spite of the frequent regens,able to clock 280 hours without any breakdowns but this isn't the kind of longevity I was looking for.Messicks list the reformer for something like $1895.00 and they only sell them as a component so they are not at this time rebuildable.It is a pretty small part and shouldn't be worth more that 2 or 300 bucks! So,judging by my experience the lifespan of their improved reformer is 280 hours.That is roughly $6.75 an hour.Thank goodness I am still under warranty but that won't last forever.The DPF muffler is also non rebuildable and with the sensors attached sells for over $3,000.00 and has a projected lifespan of 3,000 hours.

After reading about the regen problems of the b3350, I chose to go with the l2501. Hope all goes well with the repairs.