Seat Sensor

Help Support SkidSteer Forum:

nobull1

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 4, 2007
Messages
196
Well I was out trying to get my seat sensor to work, other than just when you moved a certain way or leaned back real had. This appeared to be the easiest job of the day as accessibility was right in front of you. Should have known it was only a lure into Murphy's law. All went fine until I tried to take the nut and bolt off to remove the sensor(thought I would put a washer under the post so I didn't need as much seat pressure). When the bolt started turning I smelled a rat. I found that you can't really get your hand inside to hold it, and appears to have a smooth head(maybe a allen head in the middle?). The next thought was to remove the seat, but the bolts are real rusty looking, and figure this is another scam of Murphy to get me in deeper(by this time I am onto him). So I figure the best thing to do is to just short two wires together and by-pass it altogether. Having the seat bar sensor gives you a safety and I figure you can live without the seat sensor. Does anyone know what colour the two wires are you short together? I can use my multimeter to see which are powered/shorted when in the right position, but Murphy keeps looking over my shoulder, and I don't want to give any opportunities.

Thanks
Brian
 

skidsteer.ca

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 20, 2006
Messages
3,853
Brian
Actually you can't just short the wires together, to the best of my knowledge. The sensor somehow works by moving a magnet on one 1/2 into close proximity of the sensor on the other half.
Bobcat had some trouble with these, mostly do to people getting debris behind tthe seat and impeading the travel of the seat down. They now make a kit that eliminates the seat sensor and ads a green "press to operate" button on the dash. Its @ 200 to 250 though.
What I'd recommend in removing the sensor finding which way the magnet has to be positioned to turn the "seat" light on on your "bics" controller on the rh side beside the seat.
Then use something like shoo goo to glue it in that postion. then tie it up out of the way. So long as the second sensor works on the seat bar you will still have all the safety features, when you lift the bar up., and it will save you from having to press a button every time you turn the key off or lift the seat bar.
Which I never really understood how the extra step of pushing the button to get the loader to work, made things safer
Personally I've had no trouble with this one as long as you keep your pop cans , gloves, gravel etc out of the operators station. And your seat bolts stay tight.
Some seats you can simply slide right out the front of the track just by releasing the lever that slide the seat fore and aft.
If that won't then you will have to try and hold the bolt head inside the seat track somehow. The 3 other seat bolts you could just grind off if necessary, but not on the sensor one.
Unfortunately, the foam that leeps the loader quiet, makes it bad for rust in this area.
Ken
 
OP
OP
nobull1

nobull1

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 4, 2007
Messages
196
Brian
Actually you can't just short the wires together, to the best of my knowledge. The sensor somehow works by moving a magnet on one 1/2 into close proximity of the sensor on the other half.
Bobcat had some trouble with these, mostly do to people getting debris behind tthe seat and impeading the travel of the seat down. They now make a kit that eliminates the seat sensor and ads a green "press to operate" button on the dash. Its @ 200 to 250 though.
What I'd recommend in removing the sensor finding which way the magnet has to be positioned to turn the "seat" light on on your "bics" controller on the rh side beside the seat.
Then use something like shoo goo to glue it in that postion. then tie it up out of the way. So long as the second sensor works on the seat bar you will still have all the safety features, when you lift the bar up., and it will save you from having to press a button every time you turn the key off or lift the seat bar.
Which I never really understood how the extra step of pushing the button to get the loader to work, made things safer
Personally I've had no trouble with this one as long as you keep your pop cans , gloves, gravel etc out of the operators station. And your seat bolts stay tight.
Some seats you can simply slide right out the front of the track just by releasing the lever that slide the seat fore and aft.
If that won't then you will have to try and hold the bolt head inside the seat track somehow. The 3 other seat bolts you could just grind off if necessary, but not on the sensor one.
Unfortunately, the foam that leeps the loader quiet, makes it bad for rust in this area.
Ken
I guess it would have been too easy to just short wire a to wire b. What sucks is if I could just get the nut off the bolt for the sensor I could probably fix it in 2 minutes. When we get a warmer day I think I will try to put a little 2 part epoxy steel putty on the bolt head and onto the surrounding metal. If I sand it as clean as I can by feel, and make a bit of a knob on top of the bolt head out of epoxy, even if it doesn't adhere to the surrounding metal, mabe it will stick to the head enough for me to hold it while turning the nut. I tried sliding the seat but it appears not to want to come off the front. Anyone have a better idea?
Brian
 

bobbie-g

Well-known member
Joined
Mar 15, 2004
Messages
577
I guess it would have been too easy to just short wire a to wire b. What sucks is if I could just get the nut off the bolt for the sensor I could probably fix it in 2 minutes. When we get a warmer day I think I will try to put a little 2 part epoxy steel putty on the bolt head and onto the surrounding metal. If I sand it as clean as I can by feel, and make a bit of a knob on top of the bolt head out of epoxy, even if it doesn't adhere to the surrounding metal, mabe it will stick to the head enough for me to hold it while turning the nut. I tried sliding the seat but it appears not to want to come off the front. Anyone have a better idea?
Brian
Brian, I had a similar problem a couple of years ago. Happened when I had the Bobcat on a trailer and tried to drive it off. The "parking brake" would not disengage, and the seat light on the BICS would not illuminate. I checked my notes, and to my chagrin I did not note how I fixed it. I do remember encountering three wires to the seat sensor ( I, too, was going to just short them together). I believe the three wires are common, excitation, and signal back to the BICS, but that's just my guess. I think what happens is a magnet interacts with a coil of wire and somehow that generates a signal that says the "switch" is closed. Clever, because there is only the magnet that slides inside a sealed coil. Nothing to wear out or be exposed to the elements. In my case, accumulated gunk under the seat prevented the seat from traveling downward far enuf to activate the switch. As I recall, we had to pop the ROPS cage open to access the seat bolts from the bottom of the mounting for some reason. Maybe we had to remove the seat to get to the switch. And I do recall something clever about not being able to remove the switch as simply as it seemed. Anyhow, it took about an hour to shim the switch down (or up?) with a washer so we would get a reliable seat light on the BICS. Or maybe we shimmed the seat instead. Sorry I can't remember better how we solved that one. But the solution involved making the sliding plunger get to the right place inside the housing, not simply shorting a wire. ---Bob
 

Fishfiles

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 8, 2007
Messages
1,698
As someone mentioned to fix your problem the right way would take buying a seat sensor elimination kit which is pretty expensive at about $200 , it comes with a new Bics box which has no seat sensor light , a new push to operate button and a new operation chart for behind the seat , it dos away with the sensor ,very easy to install -------- I have found that Bobcat is bad about not field testing their products and have to come back and make retro kits to fix the problems which come up , this kit I mention was free for a while if you brought your machine in for that problem even if it was out of warranty , but the dead line for that long expired and you will have to pay for this upgrade ------a quick field fix would be to take a hose clamp worm drive type about 1 1/8 inch size , raise the cab back and push down on the seat to make the sensor make contact with the magnet , take the clamp and put it around the seat sensor , wrap it around the black square and the white round plunger and tighten it down , if you do this right it will keep the sensor engaged all the time , as far as jumping wires out have never figured out that one yet , I do know they use 6 volts to run the Bics sensors fishfiles
 

Latest posts

Top