2013 MTD/Murray 13AN772S058 42" PTO won't engage

prometheis_78063 said:

I flipped the pulley down side up with the same result. I returned the pulley to the original upright position (flat side up) and moved the washer from under the pulley (as described in the parts diagram link above) to the the top of the pulley between the the pulley and the cap. It worked! I could tighten it down and still have the pulley spin freely! The unit is now back together, tested and cutting like a champ (but now I have to cut my grass)!

Seems I may have to re-level the side to side adjustment screw (pg 22 in the owners manual) as the left side is 1/2" higher than the right. I'll wait until I cut the grass to see for sure.........until next time, thank you all!

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Glad to hear you are up & running.
While pattern parts are a God send for keeping old mowers mowing , they can require a little fetteling .
Good chance either the bushings was too short or the old covers had worn or the new pulley is a slightly different shape as covers vanished in a cost cutting exercise a long while ago when they switched to sealed bearings.

Mowed for 1-1/2 hours without incident, very happy until the belt came off the left idler pulley and belt guide. I loosened the pulley enough to slip it between the pulley and belt guide and re-tightened it and it spun freely, and checked the rest of the belt path. I engaged the PTO blade and started the 2nd half of the mow and in less than 2 mins the new belt got shredded (yes I kept the old one). Why would it work fine for 90 minutes and then suddenly turn to crap? Tomorrow I'll install the old belt and hope it won't shred. If it does I'm having an authorized MTD service center pick it up and service it. My patience is at it's end. This project seems to have taken on a life of its own.......and of course it's 100 deg here in TX...

"It's still cheaper than buying a new machine"

some mtd belt keepers have a bolt and another little indent to drop into when it is lined up in the correct location. If keeper is not in the correct location the belt will come off. You may want to check location it is easily moved out of position when installing a new belt.

NorthBama said:

some mtd belt keepers have a bolt and another little indent to drop into when it is lined up in the correct location. If keeper is not in the correct location the belt will come off. You may want to check location it is easily moved out of position when installing a new belt.
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Yeah, I knew about the indent and placement of the belt keeper (1 of them has 2 indents). I forgot to align it before running it, dangit. I tried to rerun the belt w/o removing the deck and that's what happened. I'll be removing the deck this a.m. before it gets hot. I'm getting pretty good at removing/installing the deck. My bad, serves me right I guess, more as it happens...thanks for the input

fyi - the deck on this machine has only 4" of blade to ground clearance in it's highest setting, definitely not designed for TX hill country terrain. It doesn't even have brackets to install deck wheels. MTD does not measure blade clearance.