Bent MMM Anti-Scalping Wheel Bracket

[Martini Farmer]

Greetings.

I found a previously undiscovered stump along my driveway today and managed to bend the right front MMM anti-scalp wheel bracket. The wheel is fine and nothing's bent on that, but the bracket is bent downwards by about an inch. There's apparently no damage to the deck. The blades turn fine, no major vibrations. The other mounting points and hardware seem OK, although I haven't had time to remove the deck. I did mow the remainder of my yard (about 3 acres) and there were no issues.

So... how do I go about bending that mount point back into shape? Some light fiddling around with a sledge and then a jack yielded nothing. I didn't want to jack to much with the deck still on the tractor. If I remove it, what's the best practice for beating that bracket back into place?

TIA

 

[BruceP]

I try to stay away from using a hammer in these situations. Too much risk of additional damage

My go-to metal-bending tool is a LARGE adjustable wrench. The jaws can be squeezed down on the steel and the leverage helps with bending.

Do not forget that metal gets HARDER each time it is bent (work hardening) this is why it is more difficult to bend back into shape. Have you ever tried to straighten a bent wire?... the UNbent areas will want to bend before the bent section when you try to straighten. (because of work-hardening)

If your damage is such that it cannot be bent back reasonably easilly. Consider a more serious repair by grinding off the welds to remove the bracket, straighten things then reweld back into place. Any metal-working shop can do this if you are unable. (Be prepared to repaint after the work is done)

 

[Martini Farmer]

Reasonable. The bent bracket is pretty sturdy... or was, but I think once the MMM is off I have options.

Thx.

 

[je1279]

If you can't make any progress with it yourself, maybe an auto body shop could straighten it for you.

 

[tinkerwitheverything]

I"ve done this several times on the right front wheel. It's basically bends the front of the chute back a little bit . I put a farm jack / jackall into the opening and use the jack to open the mouth of the chute a little bit past where it seems to have to be and it springs back to the proper width. If not just keep going past where it's supposed to be untill it springs back to the proper place.