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Machinery needs to be looked after properly

Janne Seppälä is a contractor from Liminka, Finland, whose Valtra tractors have accumulated 92,782 work hours and have been serviced 184 times. Janne has all the servicing performed by an authorised Valtra dealer.

“Since I do a lot of heavy work with my tractors, it’s worth looking after them well. For professional contracting tasks the machinery simply has to work all the time. Servicing the tractors regularly helps prevent problems before they occur, even though this is not always possible,” Janne says.

He currently owns a T182 Direct, a T202 Direct, a T203 Direct and an N163 Direct. He has also previously owned a number of other Valtra and Valmet tractors, including an N142 Direct that was traded in for one of the new tractors. Janne has a small farm but works most of the time snowploughing and contracting on peat bogs.

Contractor Janne Seppälä and his son Anton chat with mechanic Tuomas Kontiokari. The service, spare parts and sales staff are all very familiar, and Janne enjoys talking with them also about subjects other than tractors.

Tractor repaired in a day

When performing heavy contracting tasks, something can always happen to the machinery. In these rare cases, good repair and spare parts services are essential. Janne Seppälä has nothing but praise for authorised Valtra mechanic Reijo Kontiokari, who just recently retired.

“I’ve always been able to call for maintenance and parts, even during evenings and weekends. The service has always been very fast. For example, once my tractor broke down while working on a peat farm, but it was back at work less than 24 hours later. In other words, it took less than a day to pick up the tractor from the peat farm, load it on a trailer, take it to the service dealer, make all the necessary repairs, return it to the farm, reattach the double wheels and get back to work. My wife drove to Suolahti in the evening to pick up new parts while the tractor was being worked on at the garage,” Janne recalls.

Even more important than rapid repairs is to prevent problems from happening in the first place. During the peak season on the peat bogs, when the tractors are hard at work, it is sometimes necessary to delay servicing by up to a hundred work hours, but even then the engine oil is always changed on time. Janne always relies on original parts and oils.

“I don’t know if Valtra’s own oil is the best in the world, but it certainly works well in Valtra tractors. Using original parts and oils, as well as authorised mechanics, is also a good idea in terms of warranties and maintaining the highest resale value of the tractors.”

Janne Seppälä finds it easy to call his mechanic and spare parts dealer.

For example, should a fault code come on, he simply takes a photo of it with his mobile phone, sends the photo to his mechanic and gets an immediate reply as to what steps to take.

Find your closest Valtra dealer here