Raptor SD 54 inch drive belt keeps coming off

[bertsmobile1]

"Technically", it's called capitalism and it's designed so that only the strong will survive. You either evolve or go extinct and it's entirely up to you. I'm not guaranteed any happiness; only the right to pursue it. Consequently, I've re-invented myself at least a half dozen times and for the most part, I'm pretty happy. In any event, if what they're doing is illegal, then by all means bring them up on charges. You'll have to convince the prosecutor that it's illegal and I doubt they'll agree with you. Of course, you could take them to civil court, but you should consult an attorney on the merits of your case first. Of course, attorneys always come out ahead even if you lose, so don't take their opinion at face value. Good luck!

And like any other system, capitalism needs to be strongly regulated or you end up with monopolies or duopolies that become "too big to be allowed to fail" to quote a previous President of the USA.
The USA used to do it really well, Your Anti - Trust laws were the world first and worked really well till the politicans became beholden to the businesses for financial support.

Unregulated capitalism does to an economy what unregulated air does to a diver, kills them slowly .

To work properly capitalism requires two things
1) a level playing field
2) a well informed market

Neither of these have existed since the 60's.

And like you I have reinvented myself several times
But unlike you I can see the destructive nature of greedy selfish parrasites like Lowes, Walmart & HF that will happily sell the country down the toilet for their own personnal financial gain.
I have seen it happen here time & time again and because we are such a small market it is a lot more apparent that in a massive market like the USA where 10,000 large companies that were household names can vanish without being noticed.
As for allowing capitalism to operate, the fact that the USA still has an automotive industry is the living proof that survival of the strongest & best rarely happens because Japanese manufacturers would have sent every US car company to the wall had not the government stepped in to prevent this happening. And it still does so that is not a level playing field in any way shape or form.
Just a small example on how deep this goes.
King leather used to supply about 25% of the leather seats used in USA cars, usually top end cars because kangaroo leather is so much better for car upholstery than cowhide.
Your government initially slapped a ban on them followed by massive import duty on them and took the company to court claiming it was being government subsidised because the leather that they bought in is made from kangaroo hide and the Australian government paid a bounty to kangaroo hunters in good seasons to cull kangaroos to keep the numbers at reasonable levels so there was a possibility that some of the leather used could have been subsidised by the government. At the same time the USA government "loaned" GM the full cost of building a new aluminium foundry, the fist to be built in the USA for over 30 years and the "loan" of course will never be paid back but because it was called a loan is not a subisity.

I am lucky by being born in Australia a country with a small population that can survive on mining royalties & food exports .
However the USA can not and it is only a matter of time before political greed , corporate greed & personal greed destroys it .
The USA is the only first world country where both the life expectancy and quality of life are in decline and have been so for the last decade so it is happening right now but because it is not happening to you , you just can not see it.

 

[bertsmobile1]

Hey Guys, turns out I had the beefed up brace all along! WHOOPS! In the pictures on this forum it was black and mine is yellow so no need for service. Didn't mean to cause so much passionate discussion. Maybe we can all save the world one mower at a time... I'll just see myself out...

Any thing that leads to a discussion between people with opposing views is a very good thing so be pleased with yourself for initating it.
One of the signs of a civalized society is the ability for people with different views to express them in fair & frank terms .
This is good it keeps society looking at themselves and not resorting to blaming of the other and becoming an echo chamber for predjuice & bigitory where small differences get amplified to God given rights and justify violence against the other.
I doubt that The Chairman & I will ever fully agree but if he has managed to make me look at things differently & I the same to him then the world will hopefully become a better place for all.
Somewhere in the middle is a wonderful place that we should all be aiming to arrive at.

 

[The Chairman]

And like any other system, capitalism needs to be strongly regulated or you end up with monopolies or duopolies that become "too big to be allowed to fail" to quote a previous President of the USA.

The fewer the regulations the better. Better for the consumer and better for the business. i don't need or want to support someone's inefficiencies. Scuba diving in the US is mostly a self-regulated industry. Sure, there's a lot of blamestorming when a business fails, but it's back to someone's desire to not change that's at the root of it. I cornered a very small market in that I own the world's largest web site devoted to diving. But hey, some upstart created Facebook and now I'm scrambling to stay afloat. Personally, I would love to see Facebook dismantled, but it's not fair to them. ScubaBoard led to the demise of more than a few Scuba magazines, and now I may be replaced by FB. It's part and parcel of having a robust capitalistic society and yes, greed (as you call it) is a driving force to succeed and make it rich.

 

[bertsmobile1]

It is going to depend upon how you see regulations.
I see them as the rules of the game and like any game you need rules that allow the players to play and a referee who is independent and unbiased.
Self regulation works where the players come together, argree on the rules then get an external unbiased impartial body to enforce them .
Unfortunately this never happens because Animal Farm ( the book )which is such a perfect description of the complexities of human nature shows us what happens.
Now while it was a treatise on communism it applies to every second of every persons life regardless of the political system you live under.

The USA dereguated the finance sector so because of it's size in the world economy the rest of the capatilist economies world had to follow suit.
And what happened, cowboy banks that cost ordinary working people in the the USA their houses, businesses and in many cases their lives. You could not call that a success could you ?
We did not deregulate to the same level as the USA did and we have just finished an enquirery into the banks which will result in hundreds of criminal charges, the banks are now forced to pay back STOLEN money to their customers, well those who are still living.
Self regulation of the superannuation industry resulted in 685,000 people being charged for financial advice that they never recieved and 27,000 of these were dead.
Self regulation of the insurance industry resulted i insurance policies that were impossible to ever make any claim on being sold to uneducated people who could not understand what they were being signed up for and there were cases where the companies had tossed these people out of their houses to recover unpaid premiums.
1Twelve years ago the state government got out of building certification and allowed the building companied to self regulate and allowing private companies to certify buildings as being "safe & to specification".
The result of this is thousands of buildings that are unsafe to live in and right now 3 that are in danger of collapse and I am talking 20 to 40 story buildings so not only will the totally innocent apartment owners in the buildings be out of pocket , many of them will be bankrupted but the adjoining blocks are likely to be damaged should one of the buildings collapse .

So no self regulation is not the best idea .
We have laws that stop every 8' tall muscle bound moron walking down the road , grabbing every small person by the throat and taking their wallets
No sane person would say this is good because it is capitalism in operation, the survival of the fittest and the weak can perish .
Yet when it comes to business we seem to think this is fine the 8' tall monster of a man ( Lowes ) is allowed to beat up & steal from the 50 lb 4' tall weakling ( local dealers ).
I am 100% with you when it comes to allowing efficient innovating business to prosper and allowing inefficinet obsolete businesses to fail.
The dealer network is not the best plan as dealers are guarranteed a monopoly on the distribution of a particular brand so to work it has to be regulated so every house is within the footprint of more than one dealer.
This will drive effiencies and have proper competition which will benefit the customers and all of the competitors are playing by the same rules.
When you toss massively cashed up retailers like Lowes into the field then you effectively have 2 teams on the field . each with different rules and no umpire.
I am more than happy for Lowes ( or their equivalent ) selling mowers, provided they play by the same rules and either provide full service , or pay some one else to do it.
But with the system as it is now. Lowes can sell mowers, and provide no customer service and bear no cost of the customer service.
Even worse is that warranty work is alwaysa done at a lower rate than repair work and generally a dealer makes a substantial loss on providing a service to some one elses customer that they have neither a moral nor financial obligation to provide.

 

[The Chairman]

It is going to depend upon how you see regulations.

The fewer, the better. Regulations have a high cost and that should be considered.

Lowes can sell mowers, and provide no customer service and bear no cost of the customer service.
Even worse is that warranty work is alwaysa done at a lower rate than repair work and generally a dealer makes a substantial loss on providing a service to some one elses customer that they have neither a moral nor financial obligation to provide.

You've gone on and on and have yet to show how this is illegal, much less immoral or unethical. Caveat emptor. If you don't like how the big stores do business, don't buy there. Your not liking it, does not make it illegal. Having worked in automotive for most of my life, I'm used to doing warranty work at a reduced price. Having worked for Goodyear for a number of years, I also dealt with "National Accounts", which were also done at a discounted rate. None of this is illegal or unethical. Great repairmen are often horrible business men. They go into business with a hope and not a plan to succeed. Of course, they are quick to blame the big box stores, when they should be blaming themselves. Just like diving, you have to both know and honor your limits. Others can't do it for you: it's up to you.

There were several people who were surprised that I took my transaxle apart and they were even more surprised that it's been working ever since. I'm a fairly gifted mechanic and found the repair easy. Quite easy. Yes, I know my limits and feel comfortable with pushing them a bit. However, you won't find me starting up a lawn mower business, because I would suck at it. Oh, everything would be fixed, but I'm not disciplined enough to keep up with taxes, stocking and other essentials for running a business. The playing field is already level enough. I want less government in my life and not more. That's how I view regulations. In fact, that's one of the many reasons I moved to Suwannee County. Fewer regulations and the cheapest taxes in Florida. Less is better with fewer intrusions by Big Brother. It's twenty minutes to the nearest grocery store and over a half hour to a Walmart or other big box store. I live in the middle of my 10.82 acre plot and no one bothers me... much. Got visited by a bear last night. That was cool

 

[VRR.DYNDNS>BIZ]

Buy locking washers and place them between nut and frame.
It's my second Hustler and I must say, that their bolts are not worth a dime. First one, I had 54 inch deck Hustler. That literally started falling apart on deck suspension bolts after 30 hrs of use. Snapped bolts, "locking" nuts going loose. So I sold it and now have 60 inch SD and, this weekend, found snapped engine guard bolt and guard rattling as the result.
If I were you, crucial components, I'd have ditched their bolts and replaced them with automotive grade ones, with locking washers. On my deck height adjustment bolts, I even added 2nd locking nut on top of the OEM nut. In this manner, double nutted, there is no way it will go loose. Prolly will snap eventually.

I have seen similar issues with the fan near the belt path. I have solved a unit by 1) replacing the fan and 2) trimming some off the blades. The theory is that under some fans that push air away from the belt, the blades are also pushed toward the belt as they flex. Some designs push the air over the belt and thus push the blades away from the belt. These then do not benefit from trimming the blades. Heat, lack of cleaning and further temperature makes the blades more flexible. Some blades have been redesigned to make a better design. In all designs, debris can eject the belt towards the fan and do damage that then degrades the whole process of failure till properly repaired with a new fan.

 

[ukrkoz]

Fabrication by numbers, that drove GM into bailout, is what is causing all this. We do not have quality fabrication anymore, we have just adequate one. Same principle, when applied to healthcare in late 80s, resulted in what we have now there.

 

[Mr. Mower]

Sub'd

 

[bertsmobile1]

Fabrication by numbers, that drove GM into bailout, is what is causing all this. We do not have quality fabrication anymore, we have just adequate one. Same principle, when applied to healthcare in late 80s, resulted in what we have now there.

No one to blame but yourselves and the stupid idea that an economy can continue to grow forever and that everything MUST get cheaper every year so next to no one is willing to pay a fair & reasonable price any more for anything anymore .
Have a little talk to people in your social circle and you will find plenty of people on $ 30 /hr or more who will happily spend 2 hours on the web scouring the world to save $ 2 on an item then complain that they have no time to do anything any more.

Then add to that very few now days work with their hands so very few can tell the difference between quality & shinny junk.
So he who makes& sells the prettiest junk prospers & he who makes quality products end up in a bankrupt court.

 

[Jeff Hamm]

So, I checked the bolts, everything is find for mine, but this fan just sits on the belt and knocks it off immediately once i start it. Can anyone tell me what’s going on? Nothing is bent or missing.