I bought a Lawn Boy hlx z340 about a month ago. (Model No. 81245 Serial No. 250000549) Before that, it had sat for over a year due to the right side hydro being weak.
Since buying it, I've tuned up the engine and got it running again, bought a new belt for the right side hydro hoping it was just a loose belt, and removed the hydros. They are hydro gear zt-2200's (non serviceable).
A few days ago, I opened up the trans case to not really finding anything obviously wrong. The center section has wear marks and a few tiny, tiny groves running "against the grain." Nothing caught my fingernail when feeling for anything. I dont know if these tiny, unfeelable grooves could be enough to cause failure. The magnet in the filter has a few small shards on it. I don't know if the small amount of shards should be concerning or not. When I drained the oil, there was close to 1.5qt so the level wasn't low. The oil seemed a little milky in color. I don't know if that points to anything else that could be wrong. I'm not familiar with working on hydrostats at all. Im attatching pics of the center section surfaces and filter. If anyone has any advice on what else could be my issue, let me know!
My apologies, I'm new to forums and don't totally know how it all works. I thought that maybe since the subject was getting further and further away from the title of the thread, I wasn't getting notice from more of the right crowd and made one with a new title. Could water contamination cause complete failure over time? Could water just have crept in thru a bad seal somewhere? Thanks for the reply!
