I accidentally put |search remove=1 instead of |search remove=0
in the search I provided above, the initial search looks for TICKET_OPEN events with TYPE=EQUIPMENT and any TICKET_CLOSED events. the stats command should grab the latest CREATE_DATE and the earliest CLOSE_DATE for each TICKET_NUMBER as well as which sourcetypes and how many sourcetypes reported for each TICKET_NUMBER. By running the remove eval and searching for 0, you should be removing any TICKET_NUMBERS that only have a TICKET_CLOSED TICKET_NUMBER and should be left with any TICKET_NUMBER that has TYPE=EQUIPMENT.
If the above truly doesn't work and I'm not understanding clearly what the issue is, the only other option I can think of would be to reverse the joins, although you still might run into your limit issue.
index=xyz sourcetype=TICKET_CLOSED | fields TICKET_NUMBER, CLOSE_DATE| join TICKET_NUMBER [ search index=xyz sourcetype=TICKET_OPENED TYPE=EQUIPMENT | dedup TICKET_NUMBER ] | table TICKET_NUMBER CREATE_DATE CLOSE_DATE
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