# Enerpac 10ton hydraulic cylinder rebuild



## mattthemuppet2

This got thrown out as the cylinder was leaking and I've always wanted a hydraulic press, so this followed me home and sat for many months until the time came for me to fix it and use it to replace the bushings in the rear suspension of my Focus (still had some uneven tire wear, even after replacing the shocks and springs). Thought I'd post this as much as a guide for others wanting to do a tear down as anything else

now that I've got some sleep after spending 20h or so working on the car this weekend..


I followed the procedure outlined 
here which also has a parts diagram.


Before I go through the pictures, the 2 major PITAs I had were; 1) getting the quick connect fitting out of the cylinder. It took a whole lot more force with a 25mm (prob. should have been 1in, it was pretty tight) spanner than I was comfortable with. 2) I couldn't get the nut off the spring tension screw in the base of the cylinder (piston just rotated), so getting the screw out with the spring under tension was a complete arse ache. That was pretty much it though.


One plus side was that in trying to get the spring tension nut, the captive nut with the wiper seal unscrewed, so that was easy




lower guide showing orientation on the piston








upper spring screw



Piston coming out








seal and spring clip thing




now that I can grip the cylinder I can undo that damn nut



now you can see the copper washer and spring tension screw (that would have made taking out that other screw so much easier)




you don't need to unscrew that screw all the way (just so the slotted head is flush with the bottom of that bore), but I did so I could take the spring out and clean out any crud (there was lots)




everything disassembled and shown in it's assembly order




new seal/ ring/ clip in place (already put a new wiper seal in the bottom ring as it was perished to hell)



I then put everything back together, filled it up with hydraulic fluid, screwed in the quick connect fitting and nada. Checked the pump, lots of oil everywhere but inside it. So I pulled the handle, took out all the split rubber seals that I could get to in the plunger bore and turned them upside down to see if that would give them enough of a seal. They're not directional, just have to line them up so the splits don't all sit in a row. Sometimes you can get a bit more life out of a seal by turning it around  


Filled up the pump with the rest of my quart of hydraulic fluid and it worked. Woohoo!





pressing new bushing sleeves into one of the upper control/ camber arms




and in place - it may look like some of the bushings are tilted, but that's just because the suspension is at full droop, at normal ride height they're straight.




got to give my HF 4 1/2in angle grinder a good workout as 4 of the bolts, 2 I knew about and 2 I didn't, were seized the the inner sleeve of their bushings. Fun times. Took about 17h to do the rear (10h to do one side which made the 2nd side much quicker) and 1 1/2h to change the struts on the front. Then 2h sleeping on the couch in the dealership to get an alignment  Save for a final oil change to use up the oil I have left, it's all ready for its 2500 mile journey in a few weeks.


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## 12bolts

Nice post Matt,
I am in the process of rebuilding a ram (from a tractor implement) to use on my press.

Cheers Phil


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## mattthemuppet2

Thanks Phil, it was a surprisingly easy rebuild, only took a couple of hours at most. Do you have a thread up already on your build our are you going to wait until you're finished? There have been some seriously cool press builds on here!


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## 12bolts

The press is finished, (some time ago), I didnt do a thread on it yet. I thought I took pics as I was going but I cant find them now so best I can do is describe the process and show the finished press. At the moment it just uses a 10 T bottle jack on a temporary mount. Hence the wish to fit the hydraulic ram.

Cheers Phil


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## mattthemuppet2

I know that feeling, I thought I took more pictures of the car work, but I guess I was too focused on doing it to take pictures. Usually the best photos I take are to remind myself how to put things back together, the one of the cylinder coming out saved my bacon as I couldn't remember which way round the 2 pairs of guides went on 

it'd be neat to see how your press goes together when you get the hydraulic ram finished though!


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