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I've got a 2017 Outlaw XP with a 54" deck. It's approaching 120 hours. I've already replaced one of the idler pulleys and the other 2 aren't far behind. My replacement was with a Capitol Stampings OEM style, but I'm starting to wonder about the quality of these. I noticed on Amazon that a company sells a replacement with replaceable bearings. It's called BigBearing Billet pulley. It sounds like a great idea, but I have little doubt that they come from China. Anyone have any experience with these.

Most manufactured parts come from sources all over the world. Primarily where labor is cheap and unions do not exist. Both good and bad parts are even manufactured right here in the United States.

They are part of the HD switch umbrella, Chinese, but alot of their stuff is good quality

Scrubcadet10 said:

They are part of the HD switch umbrella, Chinese, but alot of their stuff is good quality

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I'll probably give a set of them a try. Even if the bearings don't last long, they are replaceable and I can use better bearings, such as Timkens.

Make sure you pack the bearings by hand to get plenty of grease into the inner race of the bearings. A majority of bearings fail due to minimal grease when they are assembled and greased at the factory. Minimal grease means a short lifespan.

I even remove the side seals on the "sealed bearings" to pack them and then put the seals back in place. It makes a huge difference in the life of the bearings.

Auto Doc's said:

Make sure you pack the bearings by hand to get plenty of grease into the inner race of the bearings. A majority of bearings fail due to minimal grease when they are assembled and greased at the factory. Minimal grease means a short lifespan.

I even remove the side seals on the "sealed bearings" to pack them and then put the seals back in place. It makes a huge difference in the life of the bearings.

Click to expand...

Good suggestion! Thanks.

I've learned this over many years of bearings being installed by people assuming everything was properly packed with grease.

When I was at the local John Deere dealer a couple of the guys disputed this until I showed them brand new sealed spindle bearings right out of the box. None of them had near enough grease inside.

This is how many of the companies sell more parts. They are betting that no will check them.

Most modern spindles that come with grease fittings, the grease just fills the housing, but the grease does not get inside of the sealed bearings where it needs to go. The grease fittings are an illusion to make people think they are actually doing some good by servicing them.