bertsmobile1
Lawn Royalty
- Joined
- Nov 29, 2014
- Threads
- 64
- Messages
- 24,705
Some of those decks run with belts tight enough to play a tune on them with a fiddle bow .
Remember you have to stretch the tension arm spring to get the belt on
V belts do not stretch very much they wear thin on the V edges
So a very old B section can get to almost the same thickness as an A belt of it runs for long enough .
The pivot point on most JD decks is greasable but yours might need to be pulled down & cleaned to allow full swing .
Other than that try removing the spring and see if the belt will fit without the spring on
If yes then it is a matter of stretching the spring , easy to say hard to do .
If no then you have the routing wrong or the wrong belt
Have you owned the mower since new ?
I have come across a lot of mowers where the owners decided the springs were too expensive so fitted all sorts of work around to save a few dollars without the thought that saving $ 30 on a spring could shorten the life of the $ 200 belt .
The same happens with pulleys, particular idlers .
Down here some original idlers are well over $ 100 and I for one will happily fit a cheaper one of a different size .
If this requires a different belt then I write the belt size under the seat or hood with a paint pen .
However I have been called to fix mowers that the DPO did not bother to do this and have come across all sorts of things like smaller pulleys on the blade spindles to make the blades spin faster in order to get a better cut .
This mower would throw rocks totally across the neighbours yard and into the next yard and it ate blades at a shocking rate.
Took a long while to sort that one out and in the mean time I had tried 6 different belt lengths to get one that worked
Remember you have to stretch the tension arm spring to get the belt on
V belts do not stretch very much they wear thin on the V edges
So a very old B section can get to almost the same thickness as an A belt of it runs for long enough .
The pivot point on most JD decks is greasable but yours might need to be pulled down & cleaned to allow full swing .
Other than that try removing the spring and see if the belt will fit without the spring on
If yes then it is a matter of stretching the spring , easy to say hard to do .
If no then you have the routing wrong or the wrong belt
Have you owned the mower since new ?
I have come across a lot of mowers where the owners decided the springs were too expensive so fitted all sorts of work around to save a few dollars without the thought that saving $ 30 on a spring could shorten the life of the $ 200 belt .
The same happens with pulleys, particular idlers .
Down here some original idlers are well over $ 100 and I for one will happily fit a cheaper one of a different size .
If this requires a different belt then I write the belt size under the seat or hood with a paint pen .
However I have been called to fix mowers that the DPO did not bother to do this and have come across all sorts of things like smaller pulleys on the blade spindles to make the blades spin faster in order to get a better cut .
This mower would throw rocks totally across the neighbours yard and into the next yard and it ate blades at a shocking rate.
Took a long while to sort that one out and in the mean time I had tried 6 different belt lengths to get one that worked
