Patent ID: 7975475

Claim:
A system for activating hydraulic circuits necessary for different functions on a construction machine having a hydraulic tank with fluid therein, a hydraulic pump for providing fluid to hydraulic supply lines, wherein each hydraulic supply line has a related hydraulic return line for returning the fluid to the hydraulic tank thereby defining hydraulic line pairs and, wherein each pair of hydraulic lines ends at a terminal adapted to be connected to a hydraulically operated accessory, comprising: a) at least two fixed-function hydraulic line pairs dedicated to providing fluid for predetermined machine functions; b) a plurality of open-function hydraulic line pairs available for providing fluid for other machine functions, wherein one or more of these line pairs are each connected at their terminal to an accessory for operating that accessory and the remaining open-function hydraulic lines are not connected to an accessory; c) a hydraulic flow control valve associated with each hydraulic line pair, wherein each flow control valve reverses the flow of hydraulic fluid between the first line and the second line of a hydraulic pair; d) a controller capable of selectively opening and closing each of the flow control valves associated with hydraulic line pairs, thereby controlling fluid flow to the open function hydraulic line pairs and to the fixed function hydraulic line pairs; and e) a master control panel which enables two separate controller commands to activate a single flow control valve and/or enables a single controller command to activate one of at least two hydraulic flow control valves.