New Drive Belt Burning Hot

[SamB]

There was a time yesterday when I wanted to strap the mower to a very large trebuchet and watch it FLY!

Not everyone has a trebuchet. I'd sure like to borrow yours every once in a while!! :-D

 

[SlopeMan2]

I did a dumb thing by putting a rear wheel on backwards once, and the tire rubbed the frame. First thing I noticed was a smell, which was a drive belt overloaded. I see you have some good drawings to study. Good luck.

 

[LarryJohnson]

The OP having to squeeze in the belt in is because he didn't loosen the idlers before hand.

The OP made an attempt to loosen one of the idlers when it was removed, but couldn't figure out how to tighten once it was installed. So he squeezed the belt between the two with idler installed.

 

[steelwheel]

Installed a new oem drive belt today and notice it smelled during initial test drive. Extemely hot to the touch. When replacing I noticed one of the belt guides was worn. This belt is much thicker than old after-market belt. Guides aren't bent. I rotated the worn guide , but still belt gets hot. Normal?

I believe Rivets is dead on the money. I've replaced many hundreds of drive belts, idlers and pulleys in my years and one thing I absolutely KNOW is that when any part of the drive system needs to be replaced ie; the belt, idlers, and pulleys should all be replaced at the time of repair. Yes, it will cost quite a bit more but, you will thank yourself in the long run. I KNOW for a fact that a pulley or idler that spins freely has bearings that are out of grease. It only takes a few seconds for those dry bearings to heat up, expand and seize, thus the belt drags across the idler or pulley causing irreparable damage to the drive belt or worse a fire. Start it up and run it for say 30 seconds. shut it off and touch the idlers and pulleys, you'll find the culprit in a hurry!

Installed a new oem drive belt today and notice it smelled during initial test drive. Extemely hot to the touch. When replacing I noticed one of the belt guides was worn. This belt is much thicker than old after-market belt. Guides aren't bent. I rotated the worn guide , but still belt gets hot. Normal?

 

[LarryJohnson]

I believe Rivets is dead on the money. I've replaced many hundreds of drive belts, idlers and pulleys in my years and one thing I absolutely KNOW is that when any part of the drive system needs to be replaced ie; the belt, idlers, and pulleys should all be replaced at the time of repair. Yes, it will cost quite a bit more but, you will thank yourself in the long run. I KNOW for a fact that a pulley or idler that spins freely has bearings that are out of grease. It only takes a few seconds for those dry bearings to heat up, expand and seize, thus the belt drags across the idler or pulley causing irreparable damage to the drive belt or worse a fire. Start it up and run it for say 30 seconds. shut it off and touch the idlers and pulleys, you'll find the culprit in a hurry!

Rivet concluded the bearings were worn and apparently the cause of the problem. At the time, I concluded that the pulleys were turning freely, not binding, not wobbling, and were not the cause of the heated belt. From your explaination above, I now understand why the pulleys aren't suppose to spin so fast - no grease equals fast spin. While the pulleys may be old and have no grease, it wasn't the cause of the immediate problem.

Received the new front pulley near the steering column. Wow, what a difference. That old one was more of an issue than the idler pullys.
Untitled by Larry Johnson, on Flickr