Need Help with Drive Problem

[kemptvilleguy]

Hi Guys,

My little L2500 has been so good to me but today she started acting strange. I'm not sure if it has something to do with the way that I installed my mower but as soon as I started cutting I noticed she was starting to slip a little on a slight incline or in the wet grass like the tires were losing traction but that wasnt the case. I disengaged the pto and it didnt seem to slip while I went up an incline. Is it something to do with the way I've got the mower aligned, maybe the pto is being pulled excessively? Any advice would be appreciated.

thank you

 

[Stumpy]

Manual transmission? Does that have a double (push clutch half way to change gears but keep the PTO spinning) or a single (pushing clutch stops drive and PTO) stage clutch? If it's a single I'd hazard a guess the clutch is on the way out, all the force of driving the deck and the wheels goes through that one plate and the deck is causing enough extra load to cause the clutch to slip. How many hours are on the machine?

 

[kemptvilleguy]

Hi Matt,

Thanks for taking the time to reply. Its a single stage clutch (pto stops when clutch is pushed in). There are only 600 hrs on the hr meter.How big a job is it to change the clutch?

Bruce

 

[Kytim]

If it has only 600 original hr's, i'd first look at a clutch adjustment. this is especially if it hasn't been done yet or recently. Is this deck original to the tractor, is it used regularly or taken off and on between other work?

 

[kemptvilleguy]

Kytim, thank you for that insight also. The mower is a John Deere mower and I had taken it off for the winter and put it back on just yesterday and the tractor immediately started acting up. I'd just completed two days of hard excavating with her and the clutch seemed fine then. Didnt notice anything wrong at all. I can only believe that the hrs are original but one never knows having bought the tractor second/third hand. What is involved in adjusting the clutch?

Bruce

 

[gurn]

Just a thought but is the mower greased up and the blades turning easily by hand?

 

[Stumpy]

Clutch isn't easy to replace, it involves splitting the tractor. You disconnect everything between the transmission and engine halves, support the end of each half and unbolt them.

I agree with Kytim and gurn that with the hours that low the clutch probably isn't done yet unless something is wrong or someone has been very hard on it. Throw your PTO in neutral and see how hard it is to spin the deck by hand (engine off please).

Down on the left side of the tractor you'll find the clutch linkage. One part of this will have a long thread that screws into a captive nut and a second free nut that locks everything together. As you spin the captive nut you change the length of the linkage and adjust where in the pedal's travel the throw out bearing touches the clutch fingers. The idea here is you want a small amount of travel before the throw out bearing touches the fingers, that's called the free play. If there's too little free play the bearing is spinning all the time which wears it out and in extreme cases the clutch may be partly depressed all the time. Too much free play and the clutch may not fully disengage. My rule of thumb is around 3/8ths to a half of an inch of free play at the petal surface.

 

[kemptvilleguy]

No its not the mower guys as its doing the same thing now with the mower removed...slipping on an incline or under force while I'm trying to use the loader. I have a guy coming tomorrow to have a look and will post the results Thanks so much for your help. Great site

Bruce

 

[kemptvilleguy]

Adjusted the clutch and determined that it's finished so it has to be replaced.

Thanks guys

 

[Stumpy]

Strange it died so early but loader work can be hard on them. Glad we could help.