Deere 8300 Autotrac Ready SSU faults

I have a John Deere 8300 with an Autotrac system installed.

The Deere system consists of

  • a danfoss valve valve added to the steering orbital
  • a flow meter to estimate wheel angle (unfortunately no wheel angle sensor)
  • a steering wheel encoder
  • an SSU controller (computer)

I have plugged my AIO box into the danfoss, made a WAS, tied the steering wheel encoder into the remotePin to disengage autosteer. Everything works great.

The only thing is that the tractor throws an SSU65 code as soon as autosteer is engaged. The SSU box detects wheel angle movement (flow meter), and it knows that movement didn’t come from the steering wheel (encoder) and it knows it didn’t drive the valve itself.

Any ideas for how to do this without throwing codes?

Do you actually need the SSU for anything? Can you just disconnect it?

I’ve read here that disconnecting the SSU will throw different faults, like “SSU module not found” type faults. And that the dealership is required to plug in and stop the tractor from looking for that module.

The SSU also powers the steering wheel encoder. I could re-power it.

That’s a solution, but I’m hoping there’s an easier one!

What if you just disconnect the flowmeter? Does it throw a fault when you steer and the flowmeter does not sense flow? Where is the flowmeter located? Can you put it in a different location so it is only sensing orbitrol flow and not danfoss flow.

I’m going to try disconnecting the flowmeter because it is easy to try, but I am expecting a “steering encoder sensed steering wheel movement but flow meter did not detect wheel movement” fault code when steering manually.

The danfoss valve is mounted right on the orbitol, with thenflow meter thereafter. There’s no way to separate the flow of the orbital from the flow of the danfoss, it’s all internal.

Is the flowmeter signal analog, digital pulses or some sort of canbus signal? Could you make a module that would intercept the value and fake a zero flow value while autosteer is on? Pass the actual value when autosteer is off.

Just another option. Not sure if it is good or not.

The flow meter sensor has 4 wires. It appears to be a hall effect encoder, I assume the flow meter is basically a gear pump and that the sensor detects rotation. It doesn’t seem to be particularly sensitive, or the SSU allows for some drift, because the fault only happens during a rapid AOG autosteer movement. Small corrections on a straight line don’t throw the fault. Once the fault is set it stays set until the power is cycled.

I could make a module to either the flow sensor or steering wheel encoder input, but that is more work then I am willing to do.

A workable solution without the dealer plugging in is to bypass the flow meter and the steering wheel encoders. If the SSU never detects movement of either then everything should be ok. I’d have to make dummy plugs with resistive loads and re-power the steering wheel encoder for my remotePin signal. It’s doable, but still hoping someone out there has been through this and found an easier solution.

@WildBuckwheat i have a John Deere 7280R from 2014 which is steer ready. Can you show me where to connect ? Or is it canbus steered ?

I have that same issue on my 6930P, it will spit a code if AOG steers hard, I came to same conclusion that it must be that it see’s large WAS change with no steering encoder input…Must be a threshhold and if it goes past it , spits a code, its the only code on my tractor, piggy backed WAS and piggy backed encoder… I just live with it at the moment but it is annoying as keeps the light flashing on the dash etc and beeps when it faults. Imagine only real fix would be to either remove SSU and reprogram tractor is not worry, or to replace WAS with a resistor and same with encoder so it just never sees any movement at all?

Definitely. I have the install manual for the autotrac fitted on my tractor (wasn’t factory fitted) and it mentions what registers to change in the corner post so as to not look for the SSU. I haven’t explored that yet. I think I can do that and pull a fuse?

I’ve read some different manuals (AgLeader, Raven, etc) for my tractor with autotrac that use the steering valve. Dummy plugs with resistors is what they do. On tractors with a flow meter (no WAS) they have you shim the magnetic pickup sensor out of the flow meter a few mm, kit comes with longer screws and a couple small bushings.

For me right now, I’m still living with the error code. Either of those solutions involves me running new power wires to the steering wheel encoder, and I haven’t felt the desire to do that yet. I should focus on replacing the steering cylinder bushings to make the intermittent violent shakey-shake go away.

I’m not familiar with that new of a Deere system. Does the tractor have a steering angle sensor or a flow meter? Does the tractor have a Danfoss valve on the steering motor, or does it have a standalone FEMA valve with 3 coils?