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I'm sure there are more than one answer. I know for a fact that some have gearboxes with multiple speeds and reverse. And zero-turns are probably using either hydrostatic or a gas-electric direct drive type system.

But is there another option? I made a post in a go kart forum about how it would be really cool and useful if someone made a kit to make the comet torque converter ( a belt drive CVT ) from an automatic shifting thing, that just shifts based on RPM and centripetal force, to one that was shifted manually by a lever.

Anyway this one guy said thats how his riding mower worked. I'd never heard of that before but when I thought about it, it makes perfect sense. Since you want your blades to spin at the same optimal speed but you want your driving speed to change. Doing that with a belt drive cvt that you can manually control sounds like a very easy way to do that.

So is this a thing in riding mowers?
Is it a common thing in riding mowers?
If it is a thing, how exactly does the mechanism work? I tried looking up the parts breakdown of this guy's mower to see how it worked but there wasn't nearly enough detail for the function to make sense.

For the go kart version, I was thinking of a sequential shifter that would work similar to the way a mountain bike trigger shifter worked. Each forward or back shift would pull or release the shift cable in a linear fashion, and that would move the belt as the drive pulley was squeezed by the shift cable. A setup like that would need a preset number of gears to function, but those "gears" would basically just be detents in the shifter, they wouldn't actually exist in the belt drive. So lets say you had 7 positions. Fully released would be neutral, the belt wouldn't grab. Then as you shift up from lets say 1st to 6th, it would squeeze the drive pulley more and more, shifting to higher and higher gears. This would be an awesome solution for a go kart. It would add a fun factor for screwing around, and being able to keep it in low gear at high RPMs would let you use it more as a utility vehicle too, which would also be very nice.

Many MTD mowers uses a single speed transaxle with a CVT belt system. Some have speed position lever mimicking a multi speed transaxle and some what MTD refers to as Auto Drive which still uses a single transaxle and a CVT pulley system. Now some of the latest MTDs are using hydrostatic transaxles. Really have to either have the real MTD model number or the mower in front of you to which system they used on the particular mower.

Even automotive vehicles are using CVT systems on some models. I have work a couple go-carts with real CVT belt drives.

A true variable CVT system is already being used on ATVs and UTVs (RTVs, commonly called side by sides). Now some do have a multi speed differentials as you choose low, high, and reverse ranges.

"Now some do have a multi speed differentials as you choose low, high, and reverse ranges."

tell me more about THAT. The MOST ideal solution for me would be some type of gearbox that has a normal forward, a low range forward, and a reverse, all hooked up to a regular old automatic CVT belt drive!

I haven't seen the high/low transaxle setup in years. The late 90's, early 00's garden tractors from MTD (Cub Cadet, Yardman) had that setup. They referred to it as the 14 speed. You had the high/low differential with a 7 speed CVT selector. So basically translated to a 14 forward 2 reverse.

That would be perfect for what I'm looking for. Because not only do I want a high and low forward, and a reverse, but I also want to put an open differential on this machine so I can actually take corners without the worlds worse understeer. AND I want to hook it up to my factory CVT. It would all be perfect!