Mower deck spindles get hot
 

I've got one of those International 3 blade mower decks out of the 60s with the cast iron ends , no serial number.

This is the first time mowing with it, after doing a few passes I stop to pull some mechanical checks and noticed the 2 outer spindles was getting pretty hot, I had pumped a LOT of grease in them before starting.

Is this normal or do I have internal problems, both spindles have no play or slop.

how long did you mow?

Just a couple of passes 200 yards maybe....I was wondering if the belt that turns the blades is to tight, I'm using the belt that came with the mower deck and I could hardly get it on....thoughts please.

I've never encountered any shaft bearings getting real hot under normal use, that goes for mower decks, combines, hay balers, etc. Sometimes I use one of those infared thermometers to check temps on combine bearings, and they are generally about 30 degrees hotter than the rest of the machine, some get a pinch more, but you can hold your hand on any of them even after a few hours running. Either those bearings are already bad or that belt is ridiculously tight and putting tremendous side load on them, but you would think it would have broken the belt. Just realized you may have one of those old style decks with the "water pump" style bearing in it, I have probably ran some mowers with that style but can't say for certain. I still wouldn't think those would get that hot after a couple minutes running. I re-read your post, explain a little beter what "pretty hot" means---can't touch it, can't touch it more than a few seconds without getting burned, warm but not as hot as a cup of coffee.

Can't touch it....I'll look at getting a larger belt in the morning and remove that from the list if that wasn't the problem

With the belt off turn each spindle by hand and try to feel if they are rough turning compared to the one not getting hot, if they feel rough likely brgs are bad the belt should not be so tight as it takes all the travel out of the idler/tension pulley.

When you pull the belt off, spin each spindle and see how noisy they are. Has this deck been sitting out in the weather for a while and possibly gotten water in the spindles? I know you said you greased them, but if they were all gunked up, that may be the problem.

When you engage the PTO and deck does it really bog down the engine? If a PO has "rebuilt" the spindles it may be assembled incorrectly and have too much side load on the bearings. Those old style spindle assemblies had spacers that need to be the correct size in order to properly tighten the pulley. If not...they can be over tightened.:bigthink:

I don't think I've ever seen a cast end deck with a spring tensioner idler pulley.

I believe the idler will have a slot where you manually adjust the tension, if you didn't loosen the pulley when putting the belt on, it probably was difficult to install. The question is, how tight is the belt once it's seated in the grooves. Putting the belt on the largest pulley last will make installing the belt easier.

Remove the belt, turn the spindles and idler by hand, see how they feel and act accordingly. Might not hurt to take them apart, clean them out, inspect the parts and look at the exploded view (from the tech section) to make sure they were put together correctly.