harryset
Member
- Joined
- Apr 12, 2013
- Threads
- 3
- Messages
- 16
I have a couple of Craftsman tractor/mowers. One is an older 18hp model and the other is a larger big green 24hp garden tractor, 917.273220. My first beef is with the model numbers. . .why can't they be more simple like other brands.
"Big Green" has been a real workhorse for me. The first thing I did was get the sleevehitch lift system installed, bought the 8hp tiller, blade and scraper box for it, quickly followed by the big, heavy, snowblower attachment. BG spent a good part of the first year pulling logs out of the woods that I was clearing for our new house. After that task was done, she spent her days prepping the driveway, tilling gardens, moving snow and mowing woods into lawn. None of these were easy tasks. Everything held up well except for mower mandrels, and I can't blame them because they were doing some heavy-duty cutting.
Now, over the past 5 years, I have had problems with her not moving when the temps get down into the 0degree and below levels,Transmission would simply lock up after only a couple of minutes of running, ran great all summer. Craftsman, and many other sources list the transmission as being "non-serviceable", so I spent most of my time trying to decide whether to replace the hydrostatic transmission, or not. Finally got her lifted up and started looking around for any other possible solutions. (standing on my head in the snow, of course)
This inspection revealed something obvious. . .There's a filter on the transmission! Filter cancels out the "non-serviceable" label that Craftsman puts on it. It took a lot of on-line investigation to discover that I could indeed drain and replace oil in the transmission, with a lot of tedious work.
The the transmission oil during the first dump was elephant grey. Water in the transmission! Drained and flushed, drained and flushed, drained and flushed. Installed new filter, ran for a while, drained and flushed, drained and flushed, drained and flushed. Finally after 3 years of having to wrestle with my walk-behind snow blower, I got to use it last year.
This season, I spent time getting everything prepped well ahead of the snow season. First snow, temps up in the low 30's, took it out, ran it for 5 minutes up and down the driveway, and if froze up again. Has now sat in a snowbank all winter.
Now I'm headed over to the Cub Cadet side to see what my new machine will be.
After this long, long, story, I'm still looking forward to breaking out Big Green when the snow melts and I can get her back in the yard.
"Big Green" has been a real workhorse for me. The first thing I did was get the sleevehitch lift system installed, bought the 8hp tiller, blade and scraper box for it, quickly followed by the big, heavy, snowblower attachment. BG spent a good part of the first year pulling logs out of the woods that I was clearing for our new house. After that task was done, she spent her days prepping the driveway, tilling gardens, moving snow and mowing woods into lawn. None of these were easy tasks. Everything held up well except for mower mandrels, and I can't blame them because they were doing some heavy-duty cutting.
Now, over the past 5 years, I have had problems with her not moving when the temps get down into the 0degree and below levels,Transmission would simply lock up after only a couple of minutes of running, ran great all summer. Craftsman, and many other sources list the transmission as being "non-serviceable", so I spent most of my time trying to decide whether to replace the hydrostatic transmission, or not. Finally got her lifted up and started looking around for any other possible solutions. (standing on my head in the snow, of course)
This inspection revealed something obvious. . .There's a filter on the transmission! Filter cancels out the "non-serviceable" label that Craftsman puts on it. It took a lot of on-line investigation to discover that I could indeed drain and replace oil in the transmission, with a lot of tedious work.
The the transmission oil during the first dump was elephant grey. Water in the transmission! Drained and flushed, drained and flushed, drained and flushed. Installed new filter, ran for a while, drained and flushed, drained and flushed, drained and flushed. Finally after 3 years of having to wrestle with my walk-behind snow blower, I got to use it last year.
This season, I spent time getting everything prepped well ahead of the snow season. First snow, temps up in the low 30's, took it out, ran it for 5 minutes up and down the driveway, and if froze up again. Has now sat in a snowbank all winter.
Now I'm headed over to the Cub Cadet side to see what my new machine will be.
After this long, long, story, I'm still looking forward to breaking out Big Green when the snow melts and I can get her back in the yard.
