Garden tractor acquisition

[kevm14]

Trans group for my Simplicity: https://www.partstree.com/parts/simplic ... odel-1326/

It is considered Tecumseh because I think they bought Peerless somewhere along the way (before they went under).

I randomly started thinking about this. I had incomplete Peerless research. Tecumseh actually owned Peerless since 1963!! Tecumseh sort of imploded around late 08/early 09 and it was then that Husqvarna actually bought Peerless.

Also in 2008, Certified Parts Corporation, headquartered in Edgerton Wisconsin, acquired the majority of the remaining assets of Tecumseh. In mid 2018, Certified Parts Corporation acquired Peerless from Husqvarna, re-uniting it with it's sister operations.

http://www.peerlessgear.com/EpiphanyWeb ... aspx?ID=25

That's kind of funny. But yes, it looks like the 1300 series is still a current product.

http://www.peerlessgear.com/EpiphanyWeb ... aspx?ID=18

It would be interesting to see the price points of models sold by any of these guys to see if they have a 1300. And then it would be interesting to see what kind of hydro they had. I am skeptical that you are going to get a robust hydro transaxle at the $1400 price point (I have a receipt for my Deutz from 30 years ago that was $1,750 so....).

EDIT: Holy shit, Peerless service manual. Pretty simple construction. Oddly, it seems to call for gear oil though...that's confusing.

[bill25]

After a quick look, neither Craftsman or Husqvarna advertise the hydro trans. Craftsman says nothing, and Husqvarna just says Tuff Torq.

[kevm14]

First snow with the Deutz! It was wet. Maybe 3-4". I got fancy and captioned the video all over the place (Ian filmed, nice and shaky).

https://youtu.be/WuhEl7ARAbA

I am going to need a tarp for this. Snow clearly blows onto it. Also I poked several holes in the seat with my snow brush. So it now has some nice Gorilla tape.

I tried to capture how it climbed back under the deck. Despite some unevenness and inclines, it did well. The Terra-Grips are a bit too big and require fiddling every so often. I may try something with zipties yet.

[kevm14]

I checked the oil last night because I was curious. Oil is down a little but still in the upper region of the cross hatch. I'll probably run it next time without adding any and see where it lands after the second storm. Then I can assess a little better. It probably wants something thicker than a 5W-40 (it's full synthetic). I wish I could just run my old Delo 400 15W-40 CJ/SM!! But of course they had to stop making it.

[frankbreau]

That is pretty sweet. How long does it take to do the whole driveway?

[kevm14]

I didn't do a good job timing it but you can see how fast I was driving and it is a 42" blower. I think the long part of my driveway is only 4 passes wide (4 passes should do 13 feet with a 3" overlap each pass). So that part would be cleared extremely quickly. It seems like it takes just as long to do all the edge work, clear off cars, back them out, shovel the walkway and steps, etc. I will have to time it better next time. It would also be interesting to compare to my 26" walk-behind.

I was thinking more about this. Aside from traction issues, the snow removal should really just be a function of horsepower. That should correlate pretty well to total snow removal vs time, assuming you select a speed that runs the engine at wide open throttle (and who doesn't do that, right?). The width should not matter much as long as you can basically max out the capability of the machine/engine.

Also this stuff was wet. It may be fairly effortless to blow like 8" of powdery stuff. We will see next time! For a bigger storm, the walk-behind will probably be more critical. It will eventually be needed to get the tractor out to the driveway from behind the house. It will probably also be needed for the end of driveway mess, mailbox, etc. I also tend to blow a path around to the front to clear the walkway and also help clear a path for the oil guy if needed. Again, we will see.

For heavy stuff, the blower height has 2 higher settings on the lift lever. So I could hold it up if I really needed to take multiple passes at the same snow. I don't know how well that would work in practice but it seems like an option. I could see that being an advantage because not only would it be blowing less snow at a time, but it may actually give the Terra-Grips some snow to get traction rather than a bare/icy driveway. Then I would go back and do everything with it on the ground. That would add significant time but only for large storms obviously.

[kevm14]

After watching a bunch of tractor snow blower videos, I finally saw one that showed chains with bungie cords on the outside of the wheel. It looked like there were 2, at a 90 degree angle. Not sure why I couldn't come up with this on my own...

But yeah, like 4 short bungie cords may solve my Terra-Grip issue. I figure it would tighten down the outside and the inside would hopefully remain even. The whole thing will probably be pulled to the outside but as long as the rubber is still uniform across the tire, I don't think this matters at all.

Harbor Freight? Maybe TSC...

[kevm14]

Also according to some other videos, particularly one with a brand new John Deere X350 and 44" snow blower, my 30 year old Deutz provides similar functionality. If I had an 18 hp Briggs twin (they made them up to over 20), then I'd say it would be close. Only thing is that JD is a 2 stage which does throw farther but still. A rig like that from a dealer goes for like $5,500 or something. It's insane what people spend on stuff. Word is it uses a junk hydro, too. I guess the models with power steering and hydraulics use better hydros (go figure). Those are even more expensive.

Yeah. So I'm happy with what I have!

One more nugget...not that I identified any traction problems but I can add even more weight by filling the rear tires with liquid. Some people use windshield washer fluid. But there's a company called Rim Guard that uses beet juice. Apparently it is 11 lbs/gal whereas water is 8 which is like 38% heavier per volume. Good to -35F, non-toxic and corrosion resistant. Amazing.

https://www.rimguardsolutions.com/

I guess I would have to find a dealer and buy it by the gallon, into my own 5 gallon buckets. Looking into that now just for S&G.

There is a website that tells you how much tires hold based on size and 75% fill (you want some air for cushion and as a spring for thermal expansion), and that's probably where it is with the valve stem at 12 o'clock anyway.
https://www.rimguardsolutions.com/wp-co ... lChart.pdf
http://www.counterweightblue.com/upload ... t_Blue.pdf

My rears can hold 4.6 gallons which is 50.6 lbs each! I could even do the fronts which hold between 1.6 and 2.3 depending on something. Call it 2? Anyway that would add 22 lbs to each front, helping steering.

Ultimately I should probably use it more before I bother but this looks like a really good idea to me.

[kevm14]

Here is what I came up with. The 18" ones were too long so I just doubled them up.

Curious to see what happens next time I use it. Hopefully the Terra-Grips do their job and don't get misaligned.

Also I tarped it.

[kevm14]

Also at HF I finally picked up a photo tachometer.

I brought two 20% coupons. You can only use one per purchase apparently. I must have looked really sad because the guy basically took one and punched in another 20% citing "open box" manually since the computer won't actually take two scans even of different 20% coupons. So my $40 tach was only $25.59, a 40% discount. Worth it!

Next time j get a chance I will check out my tractor rpms (full throttle and idle).
https://www.harborfreight.com/digital-p ... 66632.html