Maintain Your Milling Machine Investment

General Tips
Even more advice from Bethards, Chastain and Emlet on how to keep your planer attachment/milling machine working at peak capacity.

Grease, add fuel, fill the machine with water and check the tooling at the end of the work day. If teeth need to be changed, do it that night. Make sure when you go to work the next morning you can just put in the key and begin working (after your morning walk-around checking oil levels, looking for leaks, etc.).

Track and conveyor belt tensioning should be correct. If you run the belts too loose you could have some premature failure as well as some excessive damage.

When connecting a planer attachment to a skid steer, make sure the case drain line gets hooked up. If this line is not hooked or becomes pinched, this restriction would cause drive motor damage.

DELETE: Do not engage teeth with a trailer ramp or the grinding surface if the hydraulics are off. If the drum spins there is no where for the oil to go. That can cause a blown shaft or other problem.

With a planer attachment, make sure there is enough down force. If it is hopping, it is not cutting. Run at the recommended speed for the depth, material age and aggregate size.

Check filters once a week. Twice a week if performing large amounts of milling.

Conveyor belts are also crucial to the performance of a milling unit. Worn out belts will not efficiently carry away milled material from the drum causing premature wear to the teeth and drum components.