Milker problem made for a nice evening!

The hydraulic pump for our robot arm was starting and stopping quite frequently while I was doing chores this evening. I asked the technician what would cause it to behave like that. He said it is most likely the accumulator which is s pressurized gas chamber that maintains hydraulic pressure for a period of time so the pump doesn't need to run continuously too power the arm. He offered to come replace it,I asked if I could do it and he said he believed I likely could. As its a 1.5 hr drive here from his house one way we opted to go pick it up at his house instead of paying the service charge to come way out here. The Misses came with me and our youngest,we had a great evening drive together picked up burgers on the way and saved ourselves almost $300 in travel/labour doing it myself and it only took 20 min!

How do like your Robots? What kind do you have if you don't mind me asking?

Definitely something you want to replace before it makes the pump go out. Have a machine at work with an accumulator, and it's gone out several times. When it's out you can hear the pump constantly starting and stopping to keep up the pressure. It burnt out the pump once.

Donovan from Wisconsin

Yes do tell us more about your VMS . How many cows ? How many units ? How long have you had VMS , and are you happy with this way of harvesting milk from your cows ? We are maybe 5-6 years out from taking the plunge , and going in this direction here too. Bruce

We really like the vms,we have 1 unit and run 65 cows. On a really good day we can get @2.65 milkings per cow in. We have a sort gate so there's no feed only or refusals to save time. It was a huge adjustment for us and the cows and for at least the first year we really thought we made a mistake but after the fetching came down and we got familiar with some of the maintenance and alarms we really like it now. You'd be surprised how many hours you still spend in the barn but it takes less labour as before we had me plus 1 full time and 1 part time now most days it's only me spending roughly the same amount of time as before maybe a little less in the barn. The cows are milking well and cell counts are easy to manage with the online cell counter. If you could ever go spend a full week at someone's farm before deciding to put one in it sure would be beneficial as we didn't find the salesman overly honest about what they're really like because he was pushing really hard to make the sale. Some people always regret the decision of putting them in but if you love milking cows tinkering with equipment and computers you'll do fine. People that don't typically do so well get under the impression they can sleep in every day and basically have nothing to do.

We really like it,it's a DeLaval VMS

There's one of them near here too. But I imagine you've got some a lot closer.

Neighbour has a Lely robotic milker, milks 50 cows for three or four years now. She says they love it and would not even end consider going back. Most service/repair can be done over the phone. Milk quality and cow health has also Improved. As other posters say, there is a learning curve and visit lots of farms before taking the plunge. Ben

Bruce, cousins in eastern Ontario build a new barn over a year ago and installed a single Lily robot. They milk about 70 Holsteins.
Google Lachlan Glen Farms and you should find some articles.
JimB

We really like the Lely's too, the nearest dealer to hear is in another province and across a 9 mile bridge,we were concerned about service and travel for parts. There are 2 farms on PEI that do have Lely though and absolutely love them.

(quoted from post at 04:58:16 10/14/16) Bruce, cousins in eastern Ontario build a new barn over a year ago and installed a single Lily robot. They milk about 70 Holsteins.
Google Lachlan Glen Farms and you should find some articles.
JimB

Click to expand...

Small world.... The MacLachlans are good friends of mine. Went to the open house, they made a beautiful job of everything. Even have a robot that looks like R2D2 pushing in the feed. Donny tells me he still heads to the barn at 5 every morning.

You might want to check if the hydraulic accumulator can be recharged with high pressure nitrogen.

that's a good question ,I definitely will ask thank you!

I suspect it can be recharged.

I used to work at a place that had a machine with an accumulator. It got expensive replacing it, and the down time! I bought a small nitrogen cylinder, gauge/regulator, and charging hose.

Only takes a second to recharge it, it could be recharged many times before the seals wore out.

Hi David, I was at the open house as well. I was their again in June I believe after their corn and beans were planted. Very pleased with robot
milking. Gives them so much more time for crops.

JimB