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My drive belt broke on my new Cub Cadet with 29 hours on it! Not thrilled. But sm even more frustrated now because I can't get it changed. I have to drop the pulley and clutch but when I turn the bolt the entire flywhwel is turning. How do you get the bolt off? And why do they make it do hard to do maintenance on a belt which they consider wearable not covered under warranty?

Natureflower93 said:

My drive belt broke on my new Cub Cadet with 29 hours on it! Not thrilled. But sm even more frustrated now because I can't get it changed. I have to drop the pulley and clutch but when I turn the bolt the entire flywhwel is turning. How do you get the bolt off? And why do they make it do hard to do maintenance on a belt which they consider wearable not covered under warranty?

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To get that bolt off, if you're going to do it with a hand tool, you have to hold the flywheel / crankshaft from turning in some fashion...or use an air or electric impact gun, it will snap it loose....re-install the same way.

You can use an old farmers trick to hold the flywheel. Get a two foot piece of cotton rope, remove the spark plug and insert as much rope as possible into the cylinder. Slow turn the bolt until the piston stops moving and then you can remove the clutch bolt. Reverse to install.

Rivets said:

You can use an old farmers trick to hold the flywheel. Get a two foot piece of cotton rope, remove the spark plug and insert as much rope as possible into the cylinder. Slow turn the bolt until the piston stops moving and then you can remove the clutch bolt. Reverse to install.

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This is what you need in order to do it. I had to remove the pulley from my Briggs engine and the trick worked like a charm. Be sure to do this with the engine cold and make sure that you get enough of the rope in there to stop the piston from making it's full stroke. At that point you just have to slowly back the nut off using a long wrench. I would NOT advise using any power tools at this point unless you cannot get it off with a normal wrench. If you must use an impact, start loosening on the lowest setting and working your way up until it goes back on. When it comes to tightening the nut back onto the pulley/engine, use a torque wrench and get back to the proper spec, whatever it may be. Good Luck.

I 've changed the drive belt on RZT 22 horse Kawasaki . What I did was bend the belt guard back with channel locks enough to get belt on. Then bent it back.the guard is welded on , just bent it a little. Wasn't the proper way but worked.

Okay there is a slight problem using the rope trick especially if the engine is an OHV engine you have a chance to either bend a valve or push rod. Impacts are fine for getting the retaining out but should be be used when putting the screw (bolt) as it needs to be properly torqued. IN this case the retaining screw is a 7/16-20 one which is torque to 50-55 ft-lbs. Yes the flywheel will to be held stationary which why the engine shroud has to be removed.

I idea of bending the retainers works on some mower but one which electric PTOs besides the they are weaken and break later or you risk not getting back in the correct position or you might bend the drive pulley.

As for being difficult this one is fairly to do believe me there are a lot harder ones to change out.