Looking at purchasing an New Holland L785

[KR88]

Looking at buying a L785, gentleman who owns it said it lost LH drive. Under the seat the pump and or valve assembly appears to have lost a seal nearest the bell housing on the RH side with a pool of hydraulic oil near it. He went from saying he thought it was the LH motor to when I got there thinking it had more to do with the main hydraulic pump.Lift and tit cylinders on the machine are fully functional as is the RH drive motor and low/high speed. I have an picture of what appears to be the offending leak but it is not clear to me how to attach it on the forum New Holland L785 manual on page 8 there is an illustration, the pump nearest the motor RH side is what appears to be leaking. does this indicate pump rebuild time? I am unsure how many hours are on it but it does run well.The serial number of the machine is 738867 does anyone happen to know how old it is? I am a mechanic at a rental company and our fleet is all bobrats so this is an new animal for me. I am trying to decide if its worth purchasing or not at around the 5K mark and if anyone here has ever had similar issue or just solid advice. Thank you much for your time. KR

 

[hollymolly]

It doesn’t automatically mean a full rebuild is needed, but it’s worth factoring in repair costs before buying. L785s with unknown hours can be a gamble at $5K, if you’re okay tackling a pump/seal job, it could be reasonable, but make sure nothing else like the LH motor is also compromised

 

[KR88]

thank you much for the response, its much appreciated. I've spent a good while researching rebuilding the pumps and looking at exploded diagrams since the post. spoke w NH parts counter, got an idea of age on the machine. talked to a local hydraulic shop and got pretty brutal quotes to rebuild (between 1-2K) place in the midwest sells the tandem pump assembly out of a good used machine for 1400$ w a 1 yr warranty.

 

[Rayhat]

I have a 91 with 4000 hours. Had it 9 years. Awesome machine. I paid $5000 with a set of forks and a clam shell bucket. Suffolk county NY. It had the old style New Holland attachment system. It only really needed a weld on one of the axle housings that I found after I bought it. So I would pass on your machine without a massive price adjustment. Get a price on the repair and take that off. Keep in mind you can’t use the industry standard quick attach attachments without changing the front mounting plate or some serious welding ($$$) if it has the old style. They pop up for sale by me in that $5K price tag needing nothing. Nice to buy one and start using it instead of fixing it. It’s pretty much a timing thing. Can you wait?

 

[KR88]

According to NH this machine has a build date of 88', No way of knowing hours, and yes Rayhat it does still have the old style attachment plate unfortunately. It is pretty rare around me to see a 2K rated machine in any kind of operable condition for less than 7-10K but maybe I'm not looking in the right places? Been mostly scanning FB marketplace as most auction houses have a 13% buyers premium + sales tax, and you don't really know what your getting for that. recently watched an municiple auction sell an old bobcat 763 with over 7K hours on it for over 7K which blew my mind. I have a funny feeling the price of new machines (and parts) skyrocketing it brought the value of all machines up some. I should mention the machine comes w a decent straight bucket and set of forks, sent him an offer of 3500$ and he said yes, worth the gamble or walk away? I'm not in a massive hurry, but I've also been keeping an eye on machines for almost a year now around me, I am not seeing any 5K operational stuff near me anyways. (near IL and WI border)

 

[Rayhat]

Sounds like you’ve done your due diligence. Price out the work you feel it needs and see if it brings you way over $5000. After owning my machine I know I got a good deal, and it was worth more than I paid, at least another grand more. Obviously you know the market price in your area. I looked for over a year also before I had the cash I could justify spending on a machine. I found it on Craigslist and it was listed in the wrong section for months. I think that’s why I was able to get it cheaper then the $6500 he was asking for originally.

 

[st0ck1ng]

I have a L785 that I bought 18 months ago with just over ~6,300 hours, for significantly more than $5k, but after watching the auctions AND local sales for a year before that, it was the best deal I could find for what I wanted.

1 - NO significant electronics - I wanted a machine I could work on without having to go to the dealership every time something popped up. There is nothing on this machine I cannot work on or rebuild, and, I am NOT a mechanic.
-- it did have a "control module" that I have since removed, (after my battery shorted out into the machine frame and I didn't find it right away). For the nay-sayers, I was able to keep 90% of the control module "safety" features in place.

2 - Updated attachment capability, I was willing to update myself, but this one was already converted

3 - Diesel

Have had a hydraulic leak, but over all it has been relatively minor, I am hoping this winter to do a complete hydraulic pump rebuild, but here again, not something that is overly challenging.
- did have a hydraulic line go bad, so, replaced all the lines that run directly off the pumps, just because I already had the pumps out to replace the failed line.

Friends with newer machines spend as much time in the shop as I do working on mine, but my cost isn't even close to theirs.

Bottom Line: it is a workhorse, and I am glad I bought it, have added nearly 1,500 hours to it since bringing it home.

Good luck

 

[st0ck1ng]

From my owners manual.

 

[Rayhat]

I have a L785 that I bought 18 months ago with just over ~6,300 hours, for significantly more than $5k, but after watching the auctions AND local sales for a year before that, it was the best deal I could find for what I wanted.

1 - NO significant electronics - I wanted a machine I could work on without having to go to the dealership every time something popped up. There is nothing on this machine I cannot work on or rebuild, and, I am NOT a mechanic.
-- it did have a "control module" that I have since removed, (after my battery shorted out into the machine frame and I didn't find it right away). For the nay-sayers, I was able to keep 90% of the control module "safety" features in place.

2 - Updated attachment capability, I was willing to update myself, but this one was already converted

3 - Diesel

Have had a hydraulic leak, but over all it has been relatively minor, I am hoping this winter to do a complete hydraulic pump rebuild, but here again, not something that is overly challenging.
- did have a hydraulic line go bad, so, replaced all the lines that run directly off the pumps, just because I already had the pumps out to replace the failed line.

Friends with newer machines spend as much time in the shop as I do working on mine, but my cost isn't even close to theirs.

Bottom Line: it is a workhorse, and I am glad I bought it, have added nearly 1,500 hours to it since bringing it home.

Good luck

I’ve seen one L785 with the “control module” removed. Lot of spliced wires. Scares me. My worst fear is having that stop working. Right now the threaded plastic “O” ring that holds the main wire plug onto the module is stripped. The plug comes loose from time to time and when it does you turn the key and get absolutely nothing. I make sure the plug is seated at the start of every day I use the machine, and then if I bounce around a lot and get no start I make sure the plugs seated.
Ford Diesel
Converted to quick attach myself
Bunch of new hydraulic lines over the years but I have a free source.
Just replaced (10/2/25) line from the pump to the front left final drive. For some reason it had a hard pipe that made two “U” turns out of the pump under the pump and then connected to a length of hi pressure hose. About 39 inches in total combined. The distance from the pump to the drive was about 13 inches. You can’t get the hard pipe anymore and the hi pressure hose is too stiff to thread into the final drive with the clearance available. I went with a 10 inch hose and some fittings. About $140 in parts. We’ll see what happens.

 

[st0ck1ng]

I’ve seen one L785 with the “control module” removed. Lot of spliced wires. Scares me. My worst fear is having that stop working. Right now the threaded plastic “O” ring that holds the main wire plug onto the module is stripped. The plug comes loose from time to time and when it does you turn the key and get absolutely nothing. I make sure the plug is seated at the start of every day I use the machine, and then if I bounce around a lot and get no start I make sure the plugs seated.
Ford Diesel
Converted to quick attach myself
Bunch of new hydraulic lines over the years but I have a free source.
Just replaced (10/2/25) line from the pump to the front left final drive. For some reason it had a hard pipe that made two “U” turns out of the pump under the pump and then connected to a length of hi pressure hose. About 39 inches in total combined. The distance from the pump to the drive was about 13 inches. You can’t get the hard pipe anymore and the hi pressure hose is too stiff to thread into the final drive with the clearance available. I went with a 10 inch hose and some fittings. About $140 in parts. We’ll see what happens.

Rayhat,

Below link is how I did it. This is me and my machine. It is currently the one and only video I've ever made, so I'm sorry about the quality.



The connectors I used instead of having to splice into the wires- these connected directly to the OEM NH plugs.

https://a.co/d/ilJxcx1
----
You could try "zip tying" the plug in place. Feed the tie behind the module and through the wiring on the plug, I would just snug it up.

I also eliminated that weird steel hydraulic line, but I was able to get my angles close enough to connect the high pressure line (shortened the overall length significantly), but it did create a few hose to hose contact points that I made sure to add cushion between to prevent premature wear.

No idea what this amazon associate message is about, but assume it has to do with the link, I do not make anything from this.

 

[Rayhat]

Thanks. Took a screenshot of this post for reference and video title. It seems like you just hardwired the seat switch and two solenoids for the boom and bucket and just left the module unplugged. My machine used to leak a fair amount of hydraulic fluid over time and although I monitored it it would go unchecked on occasion and the hydraulic light would come on which I liked. I’d rather have a gauge instead of an idiot light, so I’ll look up those vids about Your video took away a lot of the concern I had for module failure. I’m glad to hear someone else also deleted that wacky “S” pipe out of the pump. I guess some engineer somewhere justified it.

 

[st0ck1ng]

Not sure I know what you mean by "left the module unplugged".

If you mean the "control module" that is supposed to run everything, than yes, in fact I have since removed it altogether, one of these days I'll get around to removing the unused portions of the wire harness too.