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OK more help required please forum members, the right hand rear wheel will not run free? It makes pushing the immobile tractor around to repair things very hard. I have started taking things apart for my son to paint and my job will be to get the motor running and tidy up the electricals. I took some photos from under the seat with the battery box removed. I think this machine is missing a belt which would explain the empty pulleys and I guess they shouldn't be locked together like that either, is this why the R/H wheel is locked up? Also does anyone have a schematic of the under side of an early model (2003) MTD ride-on so I can figure out where the missing belt should go? Any help greatly appreciated, 1970's two stroke motorcycles are what I am used to rebuilding so completely lost here.

Check the parking brake should be behind the right rear wheel
The pads rust onto the disc.
The brake works on the layshaft which effectivly locks the diff so the wheels can only go in opposite directions .
So one wheel is rolling and the other is trying to rotate backwards
If you have to push it try to lift one wheel clear of the ground .
Should be no problems for a KIWI
I have seen them All Blacks

Yeah them All Blacks right lol, I found putting my bike hoist under the rear worked great but I do need to find out why the darn thing is not turning. I think I am missing 2 belts from the Youtube vids I have been watching on belt changing a MTD mower, there is one good belt still on the machine which might be the drive belt from the engine. I have found a supplier of MTD parts and batteries here in Napier (NZ) and a classic older mower mechanic who is a mine of knowledge but I will still need some in-put from the forum. My aim is to get the mower running to check its' mechanical condition while my son paints the pretty parts. Still looking for a service manual for this model, does the forum have a files section with one in it?

No MTD manuals as such but MTD did put out a one manual covers all some time ago in a series of 4 called the "Must Have Manual of Outdoor Power Equipment" and you need volume 2 Rear Engine Riders & Lawn Tractors
Troll around the web they are out there

So after watching 20 or so vids on Youtube I now know how the pulley and belt system works, now I will just have to figure out how to fit them and in what order.

No MTD manuals as such but MTD did put out a one manual covers all some time ago in a series of 4 called the "Must Have Manual of Outdoor Power Equipment" and you need volume 2 Lawn Tractors & Rear engine mowers

Found it, 360 pages of confusion lol as I still cannot get a definitive model for my machine. https://www.gardentractortalk.com/d...1e52d98febf5c30a2f21a8fd3cb87cb-770-10579.pdf

You are correct. The pulleys are not designed to run that close LOL.

Hush said:

Found it, 360 pages of confusion lol as I still cannot get a definitive model for my machine. https://www.gardentractortalk.com/d...1e52d98febf5c30a2f21a8fd3cb87cb-770-10579.pdf

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Does not matter
Sit down with some of that dishwater you call beer over there in a nice sunny spot out out the freezing antartic winds and read the transmission section, twice
In principle they all work the same the only difference is how they change the tension on the belts
Early models put extra tension on the engine belt and the variable pulley was fixed, either to the body or transmission housing while latter models the variable pulley swings on an arm .
The hardest part is always taking the nut of the big pulley as they always tend to rust on , even worse if the owner had cheap skated and fitted a flooded cell battery so acid collected on the pulley
Once you have read & understood what is in the manual the rest is dirt easy

I just watched Taryl (Tetradactyl) ? do a few, he should leave the comedy to the clowns but his repairs are easy to follow. We are in late Autumn/early winter here in Godsown and the days are short and chilly, not good beer drinking weather for sure, not even good wrenching weather lol. Tomorrow new battery, air filter, oil, plug and maybe blade if the dealer has one. Found a Ride-on mower wrecker locally, who knew we even had those here in NZ? Hopefully he can supply a replacement seat as this one is growing stuff! Spiders, I have emptied a can of fly spray on the mower, these spiders I'm sure eat birds and mice, hopefully they will hijack a taxi and go back to the farm where I found this mower.

Mower seats are crazy expensive to buy
Usually you can get an auto upholsterer to recover one for 1/2 the price in OZ so probably even cheaper in the shakey islands .
FWIW I usually adapt a boat seat to replace a dead ride on seat
Easy with a MTD because the seat switch is external so any bolt on seat will do the job .

To me that what ruined him with me. I was looking for serious info and not a lot joking around so I will not even look his stuff anymore.

StarTech said:

To me that what ruined him with me. I was looking for serious info and not a lot joking around so I will not even look his stuff anymore.

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Believe it or not adding stupid humour is a proven method of increasing information retention .
The teachers who stuff around in class and are always cracking jokes or allowing student to crack jokes get a better result than the stern sober ones .
OTOH I don't find his humour funny but that is a matter of taste.
Even 55 years latter I can still remember the entire lesson , the room & the class when our Irish catholic history teacher asked "who was the last fascist dictator in Europe ? and the class clown answered "the Pope "

OK next stupid question, since I intend to repaint the bodywork of the tractor, how do I remove the rear flat section where the catcher attaches, I have removed the hook brackets but cannot see what should be disconnected next?

Answering my own post here but discovered that about 6 bolts hold that rear panel on, I also found every sharp edge under the mower and have a few new plasters on the fingers. It is the first day of Winter for us here in NZ and it is a balmy 22c (72f) so I should be down the beach I guess. I found half a destroyed belt wrapped around one of the drive pulleys which can't have helped the mower work too well. Happily I also found the rear brake which I think is holding the R/H rear wheel locked, it took some water blasting to clear enough of the rear diff to be able to see all of this, I doubt this poor machine has ever seen any love. Yesterday I got a new air filter ($24) some oil ($65 ?) and a new battery ($145) so I'm getting serious about this now. I think my next moves will be unjamming that darn brake and then removing the mower deck as I don't need it right now and it may make fitting the drive belts easier plus I really want to water blast the underside as it has half and inch of build-up of old grass and dirt. I need to get all the "pretty" bits off so my son can paint them so the rear guards section will be coming off soon too. Today's dumb question: I'm used to two stroke bike engines so when I removed the spark plug I expected to be able fell the piston moving back and forth when I put a straw into the plug hole but no movement at all? The motor is not stuck, I can turn it by hand from the top so am I actually in the inlet valve area directly behind the plug? It doesn't make sense to me but B&S motors are a new thing for me...feel free to throw insult sat me as long as they come with an answer lol.

Take photos before you touch the brake
Do not touch the middle bolt that is for adjusting the brake
Put some thing under it before you undo the 2 bolts / nuts at either end of the caliper.
There is a small brake pad and steel shim under the caliper plus another pad behind the disc.
The disc has to move freely on its spline , usually it is rusted solid .
The caliper has a face cam built into the lever and 2 pins that push against the shim & pad.
These rust solid into the caliper .
Once freed polish them and apply some dry lubricant before reassembly

Check the brake as it could be rusty. 1/2 nut under right side back it off alittle.

Hush said:

OK more help required please forum members, the right hand rear wheel will not run free? It makes pushing the immobile tractor around to repair things very hard. I have started taking things apart for my son to paint and my job will be to get the motor running and tidy up the electricals. I took some photos from under the seat with the battery box removed. I think this machine is missing a belt which would explain the empty pulleys and I guess they shouldn't be locked together like that either, is this why the R/H wheel is locked up? Also does anyone have a schematic of the under side of an early model (2003) MTD ride-on so I can figure out where the missing belt should go? Any help greatly appreciated, 1970's two stroke motorcycles are what I am used to r

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Not a good idea and will not help if the pins are rusted in place or the pads have rusted onto the disc and then when it does move he will have to readjust the brake which is a problem to get right .

Well found the brake, yes it was rock solid seized, disassembled most of it, any tips as to how to remove the frozen in little metal pistons? I have them soaking in some diesel for now. Removed carb too as I will need something to work on this week as we are expecting 6 days of rain. Found that all 3 belts are sort of still in the machine, the transmission belt is snapped and wrapped around somewhere I can't seem to untangle, the drive belt is in place but shattered and the mower belt is the only one of any use but I have a 3 belt order in at the mower shop.

Hush said:

Well found the brake, yes it was rock solid seized, disassembled most of it, any tips as to how to remove the frozen in little metal pistons? I have them soaking in some diesel for now. Removed carb too as I will need something to work on this week as we are expecting 6 days of rain. Found that all 3 belts are sort of still in the machine, the transmission belt is snapped and wrapped around somewhere I can't seem to untangle, the drive belt is in place but shattered and the mower belt is the only one of any use but I have a 3 belt order in at the mower shop.

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They tap strait through
I usually put a socket around them for support and tap on the other side with a brass mallet.
They are steel & the calliper in aluminium so you can also bake the calliper to up to 400C then tap while it is hot.
That usually shifts the most stubborn of them .
Derust & polish then refit .
Did you get the disc to slide on the spline ?

If you have some help or a place to hang a pulley you can stand the mower on it's bum vertical
Take the battery out & if there is fuel in the tank stretch some GladWrap over the filler neck then screw the cap on tight

Do not power wash under the mower et.
Clean the grass off using a compressor & long air duster
Super Cheap & nasty car parts carry one that is about 4' long

Grass clippings do not respond to high pressure water .
Pop some 2 x 4's under the deck and use them like rails to slide the deck out & back again

I like the heating idea, that has worked for me in the past with locked up motorcycle calipers, disc slid out easily. Now new dumb question: My catcher at the rear has a metal rod sticking up from it, this does not appear to be attached to anything, is it supposed to be and what purpose does it have? Photo is off Google not my mower but same model.

OK the heating in the oven worked on the brake pistons that plus some bashing with a FBH and a punch, all cleaned up now and ready to be reattached when weather plays ball. I benched the carb and it wasn't in bad condition, the bowl had some gunk and rust in it so all cleaned out and also waiting on the weather Gods. I noticed a wire near the brake system and a plug where it could attach, is this another safety thing?

Yes that will either be the seat switch some one pulled off or the reverse switch to stop you mowing backwards
The reverse switch is on the axel for Hydros, on the F-N-R lever on variable pulley drives and on the gearbox on geared models .
BE careful when you reassemble the brake as you will now have to adjust it
The brake should dissengauge just as the drive clutch puts enough tension on the belt to cause the rear pulley to spin.