Long-time ‘Planet Brendan’ citizen Owen Williamson, a farmer from New Zealand, sent me this troubleshooting story from ‘the coal face’:

“I have considerable mechanical aptitude, but at the time of this problem I had little knowledge of hydraulics — something I have since fixed. Anyway, I purchased my first ever brand new tractor. And shortly after the warranty ran out, … Read more

There are a lot of power transmission applications hydraulics has a monopoly on. But what about those applications for which there is viable competition from mechanical or electro-mechanical alternatives?

When biases such as ‘getting rid of the oil’ (and the leaks that usually go with it) and eliminating the need for in-house hydraulics expertise (which is getting harder to find … Read more

One of our members who works for a hydraulic seal manufacturer wrote me this recently:

“We receive many seal-failure complaints. And while most of these failures can be attributed to installation, assembly, poor hardware preparation or even misuse of the product, we always try to educate our customers as to the cause of failure and provide them guidance to prevent … Read more