I bought this 2004 Troy-Bilt Pony a couple of years ago as an emergency replacement for my Craftsman with a blown motor. The Pony stopped dead on me last week while mowing my orchard, engine still running blades still turning but no movement. Investigation found the variable drive unit bearings broken and locked up, I replaced those with better bearings and put everything back together, replacing upper and lower drive belts while I was at it. Ran it for five minutes in the pasture and it stopped with smoke coming from the belts under the seat, the top drive belt was shredded. The (Chinese) 754-0042 belt I purchased on Amazon was 5/8" x 31", the MTD belt I took off is 1/2" x 31-1/2", so looks like the problem there., now i'm installing the original and still good MTD belt but find that the transmission pulley is dished and i'm not sure which side is up, putting a straight edge on the pulleys shows outting one side up the pulley is about 3/16" higher than the variable pulley, putting the other side up shows it 3/16" lower than the variable.
Any help deciding which way the pulley goes would sure help. I would think that being lower the variable would open up and lower the belt into alignment, but I don't want to shred my belt again, and re-installing the 2 big springs is REALLY a pain.
Any help deciding which way the pulley goes would sure help. I would think that being lower the variable would open up and lower the belt into alignment, but I don't want to shred my belt again, and re-installing the 2 big springs is REALLY a pain.
