Congrats on the nice 1811 Tom and welcome!

The 1811 is an awesome GT. I sold one this summer to a friend. I miss it.

The steering is hard to turn with a blower on the front if the grease zerks haven't been regularly pumped with grease. The steering gear can take a lot of grease. I put some high performance Teflon lube down the steering wheel shaft and in the tie rod ends and I think that helps a lot. I also use a spinner on the wheel.

It looks as though the auger is a little bent on the snow blower. I use a large Crescent wrench, or two, to straighten my auger if it needs it.

Have fun this winter blowing snow!

PeterJ

Great score!!!!:beerchug:

Hi Guys : so I'm 2 mildish snow storms in now and can't believe how good this rig is with the blower on front - so much fun clearing my driveway ! - I actually look forward to a bit of the white stuff now. Really glad I opted for this vs a blower for my lawn tractor.

So I topped off my tranny fluid before the last storm because of the seal leak and after I was finished up noticed that I was getting a lot more leakage than before from what I guessed was the seal. However I could see a load of oil around those forward reverse check valves on top of the pump housing. I cleaned them up and then rolled the tractor back and forth a few feet and noticed oil coming out, quite a bit

Started it again drove around for a few mins, worked the hydraulics and blower and repeated the process and nothing came out they were clean a whistle!

So could I have overfilled the tranny and this excess oil was bleeding out. It seems fine now and I'm back to the slow leak on the drive shaft / pump housing.

Can someone explain what happened here ..are my valves maybe going bad?. It was really coming out and had me quite nervous but it seems to have resolved itself now.

I filled to maybe a little over the line btw

Thanks a lot folks

And happy new year !
Tom

Machtech :beerchug:

Once they start to leak they don't heal themselves. Machtech turns them around in about 8 days if you priority mail them to Mark. cost is around $80.00

Machtech Direct
605 Furnace Rd.
Conneaut Ohio 44030
Phone: 440-499-5813
Email: mark.machtech@gmail.com

So there should be no oil coming out even if over filled? , I would expect to see the leak when I roll it back and forward every time ...right now I don't see anything when I run it or roll it with the engine off.
I will keep an eye on them.

Thanks

You are right about that!:ThumbsUp:

Even if you overfilled the rear, those valves are not supposed to leak.... EVER. Overfilling the rear will cause no leak, anywhere. You would have to fill it completely full to the top (or close) before it would leak out the vent. It's not a cooling system, or a tub. It's all enclosed, and the oil level is probably 4" below the vent.

If they leaked, they will again. You can watch them, but it would be best to get started on the repair before they don't work at all, or spew oil all the time. It is also possible that oil from the front seal was blown back onto them.... you should really get that fixed too.

"So I topped off my tranny fluid before the last storm because of the seal leak and after I was finished up noticed that I was getting a lot more leakage than before from what I guessed was the seal. However I could see a load of oil around those forward reverse check valves on top of the pump housing. I cleaned them up and then rolled the tractor back and forth a few feet and noticed oil coming out, quite a bit"



SO, you could see the fluid coming out of the check valves as you "rolled" it?

I had checked these valves before and no leaking, only after a top off did I notice the oil coming out. It now does not leak when I start , roll the tractor - I was just curious if the top off was making them leak more that is all. I don't fully understand how these valves work. If air can escape one would think that oil could escape under pressure also, especially as it was after an over fill. I would expect it to happen after every run but after testing for a few days they are now bone dry. I know it wasn't splash back , because oil initially came out of clean valves when I rolled it forward and back.

It sounds like the valves are bad or going bad anyway so I will get them rebuilt .

Thanks again