Replacing mower deck wheels....

[fortyshooter]

Bought a old but great running 10 HP 28 inch cut Airens rider from a neighbor back in the Fall for 100 bucks.
Engine runs great and a new carb and battery had been put on by dealer. I bought it to keep down at my range for towing around small utility trailer
and to cut grass.
Now the mower deck needed a new belt plus replacement roller wheels. After looking around at several places for same size wheels nobody had any that would work. Checked online and found the O.E. wheels for 18-20 bucks per wheel!!! These are just a plastic wheel with no bearing.

Not to spend 80 bucks I went over the Harbor Freight and found 4 casters with tough urethane wheels with bearings for less than 5 bucks per with discount! All I had to do was crank up the lathe and make up stepped spacers which locate in 1/2 inch hole in deck bracket for a 3/8ths bolt and also
take up the space for narrower wheel. Will see how they last and if needed replacements easy to get for a set less than 20 bucks!!

Note the old black wheel with the worn flat!! Would think he would have noticed something not rolling!

[BigAl52]

Wow 100 bucks for a rider Forty. Thats a pretty good deal. But you could of spared the rest of us from thinkin about mowin season. Wife does our yard anyway so I got no reason to complain.

[RanchRoper]

Every year I expand the pastures and pens more and more, which makes less grass to cut...

[BrokenolMarine]

We replaced the tires on our compact tractor last year. All in... I think about $450. This year we just added a new battery... About $130. But, we went with R4 tires and a high end Interstate batt. The tractor is twenty years old... And still going strong. Great buy on yours. It pays to check around.

[JEBar]

nicely done .... I admire your ability to run metal working equipment

[John E Davies]

I have a fifteen year old Honda 21” self propelled mower, it uses rear wheels with steel gear teeth around the inside flange with a steel pinion (gear) on each end of the driveshaft. It was getting noisy/ rattly in Drive so I took it apart. I found the pinion teeth ground to knife points due to lack of lubricant. The harder teeth inside the wheels (and the outside tread) were fine. I had never read the manual which says grease them every 100 hrs or annually. I would have expected to see a reminder sticker on a Honda....

I ordered replacement parts .... $2.30 each for the gears, $0.40 for circlips and free ratchet reverse bits, and $0.67 each for wheel bearings.

I was stunned at the prices from an online supplier. The parts look fine and are individually bagged with Honda labels, but maybe they are Chinese counterfeits made by barefoot children and imprisoned dissidents squatting in the dust..... I don’t know how you could tell.

This was the first time I have ever bought a repair part for this mower which is used regularly. It still has the original drive belt, which required adjusting once, and the original plug. I change the full synthetic oil annually, keep the blades sharp, blow out the filter if it needs it, and use a fuel stabilizer religiously. It never fails to start on the first pull. It is mind boggling how reliable it is....

Good luck on your mower, I have rebuilt an Ariens snow thrower and those parts will make you gulp hard. Great machines though, if you grease them more than every decade...

John Davies
Spokane WA