The Classic Machinery Network

First post, as the title suggests I am trying to find the hydraulic oil level - sight glass, dipstick, something else. The JCB has a B plate (number plate ) and JCB 3 on back hoe (could the 'c' have fallen off). Fordson major tractor engine door on side of cab and rear hinge up and over door to stand up at rear controls. Hydraulic oil filler is on offside of front of cab (outside) filter is very large cylinder on front offside of cab, filler has a long threaded cap. Can't find any sight gauge or similar. Help

they didn't all have a 'c' on the backhoe, just the 3 badge.
is it like this? this is definitely a 1964 jcb 3c that had a fordson major engine. (its not mine, I just got the engine from it)
Mine is a 1963 3 pretty much the same apart from the shape of the cab (rear entry), front loader and backhoe. mine doesn't appear to have any hydraulic oil gauge or dipstick.

Hi, thanks for the quick reply. Mine is the same as the picture with a door on the near side. If they don't have a sight gauge do you just fill till you see oil at the bottom of the filler neck. How easy is it to change the hydraulic oil filter? How often are they changed?

I just recently changed my filter but my dad topped up the oil so not sure what he did.
Filter on mine came off easy enough, slacken off all the big bolts at the top and the band that goes around the filter housing (2 nuts in behind the mudguard) watch you don't drop it, its a fair old weight.
there should be a round plate and a spring at the bottom of the filter housing that the filter sit onto. I got a filter no problem from JCB, I just phoned them up and told them the exact sizes of the filter. it was about £38

Hi, I believe my JCB 3 is similar to yours. MY 1962 is my guess (Fordson Super major skid unit and round wheel archs). Do you have the part number of the hydraulic filter? Should be the same I guess.

Cheers
/Stefan

schagge wrote:Hi, I believe my JCB 3 is similar to yours. MY 1962 is my guess (Fordson Super major skid unit and round wheel archs). Do you have the part number of the hydraulic filter? Should be the same I guess.

Cheers
/Stefan

Stefan you can check the Fordson casting codes to get an approximate Idea of the age:

https://www.selen.nu/cgi-bin/trsnr.pl?lang=en

Thanks Jeremy!
Turns out the Fordson casting code indicates it was manufactured in December 1960. But I guess it was "reborn" as a JCB 3 somewhat later than that, i.e. 1961 or 1962. Anyway, I still guess the hydraulic filter would be the same as the one on the picture in the thread above. The hydraulic system is JCB own as I understand it. I am still trying to see if I can exchange the hydraulic filter.
Cheers
/Stefan

So the skid was built from castings from late '60 so very likely to be a '61 machine.

Ok, thanks. Reason I guessed on 1962 was that according to the Haynes JCB manual, production of the JCB 3 was started in November 1961. The wheel arches were changes from round to piecewice straight during 1962. So someweher in between there. Nevertheless, my question was more to find information on sourcing a hydraulic filter for the machine,

Cheers
/Stefan