Kama 554 Transfer Case & Transmission Oil Change

[3RRL]

For you Kama 554 owners and those with similar tractors.
Nearing the last of the 400 hour maintenance on my Kama 554, I changed the transmission and transfer case oils. For those of you contemplating this, here are a couple photos in case you have not done this yet. I did a couple hours of work with it before the oil change to warm it up a little. Kind of like what you would do changing the engine oil, but I don't know if it's as necessary to do as with an engine oil change. I did it primarily to get the oil warm so it would flow better.

Here is the rear end of the Kama 554 from underneath. The transmission and rear end share oil... a lot of it.
See the plugs on each side of the differential? Remove them to drain.



Start draining them first to get most of the oil out.
Be sure to have at least two large containers to catch the old oil and dispose of properly. I brought my old oil to a Napa store and they took all of it.
The transfer case is a separate unit.

[3RRL]

My manual showed there to be a center drain plug too, but mine did not have one. With most of the oil drained out, you can then remove the 4 bolts that hold the magnet on the rear end case. The magnet is on the inside of that plate I'm pointing to. It's in there to catch any metal shavings that might hurt the gears.



You can see what would happen if you took this cover off first. lol ... It gets ALL of the oil out in a hurry! So be sure to drain as much out using the other drain plugs, and if you have a center plug like it's supposed to have, use that one too.

[3RRL]

Here is a photo of the magnet as it came off the transmission.
The magnet will catch metal shavings, so it is very important to clean it off every time you change the oil. You can see mine is covered with shavings after 400 hours of hard use. When I changed the transmission oil at 50 hours, I didn't clean this magnet ... I had no idea it was there.



You will need to clean it off before putting it back, of course. Before I crawled out from under the Kama to do that, I also stuck my hand inside the opening to wipe out as much other crud as I could. There was plenty around the opening, so do that too, until the inside of the casing is as clean as you can get it.

[3RRL]

I cleaned most of the crud off the magnet, and here you can almost see what it looks like. Also, carefully remove the gasket so you can re-use it. It works fine if not damaged, otherwise, make a new one.
Clean it up too.



After you remove the gasket, clean the cap and magnet off completely. I used a small container with diesel in it to do the cleaning up. I changed the diesel for the final cleaning, since the first batch was full of debris and crud. I believe gasoline would work a lot better than diesel though, since it would cut through the build up a lot better and faster than diesel...plus it's cheaper.
You will have to pull the metal particles off the magnet to get it really clean. Use a towel and scrape all the particles off.

[3RRL]

Look what I found in my oil case.
It is a small roll pin that goes somewhere? I tried to figure out where it came from, but none of the levers that showed the roll pins in them were loose. After inspecting this one carefully, it looks like it was never installed? There is no wear nor any marks on it, and it still has the lead-in on one end that looks untouched too. I think it's brand new?
Plus all my stuff works properly so I'm not going to sweat it. Perhaps it was dropped during the assembly procedure and never recovered? At least I hope so.

[3RRL]

OK, I finished cleaning the parts up and now I'm ready to re-assemble the magnet back to the housing. I also cleaned up the gasket and was able to reuse it. You may want to change yours, but this one was just fine. They're nicely cleaned up now.
Here is a good picture of it.



When replacing the magnet, be sure to replace the other two drain plugs and snug them all down. Check the rear end for other stuff while you're under there for any obvious loose bolts or what ever might need your attention.
Then you can move over to draining the transfer case oil.

[3RRL]

Now over to the transfer case.
Here is the drain plug for the transfer case. It is actually on the lower housing where the front wheel drive shaft connects to the transfer case. See it on the left side there?
Remove that plug and drain the oil. You should have a large enough container for this drain too. I cut off the top of a 5 gallon pail and it was enough.

[3RRL]

Again, be sure to put that plug back in before you refill the transfer case.
Here is a picture from topside showing where the fill plugs are. Both have dip sticks with minimum and maximum fill level markings.
The one open (on the right) is for the transmission and rear end. The one on the lower left is for the transfer case. That one has not been opened yet. It has a square nut on top of it. Both of them also have aluminum washers, so don't lose them.



Then use your favorite gear oil to refill them both.
I don't think there are any yellow metals in our transmissions or transfer case to be concerned about, so I used Sta-Lube GL-5 85w140 gear oil for mine. If you have a concern about it, look for a yellow metal safe compound like a GL-4 85w90 or 75w90 or something like that. But I choose this because "GL-5 Heavy Duty Gear Oil is an extreme pressure, multi-purpose, automotive gear lubricant. Excellent performance for differentials operating under high speed, low torque; and low speed, high torque conditions. It meets SAE, military and commercial specs."



It is interesting to note that the manual suggests 14 to 14.5 liters in the transmission or 14.8 to 15.5 quarts. I checked the dip sticks sitting on top of the threads and also screwed down. Filling the trans to the full level with the dip stick screwed down, it took over 18 quarts.

The transfer case (middle box) also had a dip stick, and I checked it the same way. The manual says it should take between 2.5 to 3 liters, or 2.6 to 3 quarts. It also took more than that to fill ... about 5 quarts total. When the dipsticks sat on top of the threaded openings, they read in between the two fill marks, but screwed down they both went to the full mark. I had bought two 5 gallon pails for when I changed the front differential and to do this oil change, so I had enough. You may want to check yours in case it is different than mine.

Anyway, when I was all done, I tried out the tractor and shifted everything I could think of. The shifting seemed a lot smoother right away (of course) making the oil change a success. I could feel that "oily" smooth feel when operating it.
Rob-

[bradblazer]

I was just thinking "Dang, I don't remember that magnet assembly" so I looked up this thread [over there] and this was the last post:

Re: Kama 554 Transmission & Transfer Case Oil Chan
« Reply #14 on Jul 26, 2007, 9:57pm »

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Rob,

Thanks for the great post. I didn't know about the magnet.

Brad


My 4wd shaft is dripping again so I'll have to drain the gear case to fix it. I'll go ahead and drain everything and check the magnet then.

[3RRL]

Thank you Brad,
I was hoping this thread would help one of the Kama 554 owners!
Rob-