Cub Cadet qa42a soon to be qa42b snowthrower

[Doug Rusk]

I dont know why yours is so abrupt.

Just my opinion but these are what 40 ish year old units? Been working with the original equipment all this time. I don't see much reason to reinvent the wheel.
Maybe you need a new pto switch as you say yours is difficult to move? You do know on a 782 you pull the spring loaded outer shell up to engaged it? Has a safety thing built in so it can't be accidentally engaged. Shutting off just push the switch down like a regular toggle switch.

 

[walls00000]

Thanks @Doug Rusk. My PTO switch works as you describe, although I've been pulling the darn thing out to shut it off too. Maybe thats the issue Ive been facing all along with turning it off! (Easy fix: replace driver with new one)

I have to say though, pulling it out to engage it doesn't always allow it to move smoothly either. It's subborn that way. I've lubed it etc., but it doesnt seem to get any easier.

 

[walls00000]

Back at it on the snow thrower . . . I finished putting the gear box back together, filling it with 75% grease and 25% 80W90 gear oil. (happened to have it on hand and it looked good). I cut a gasket out of cork and used some gear oil gasket maker and installed the bolts.

 

[walls00000]

Next I needed to address the wobbly key slot on the u-joint end of the drive shaft. The key that was there moved quite a bit and made the slot wider by almost 1/16" at the widest spot. I bought some new 3/16" keys at Tractor Supply and some JB Weld epoxy and went at it. I was super happy when the JB Weld dried, the key was snug in the slot and looked great!

 

[walls00000]

BUT . . . when I went to assemble the u-joint onto the shaft, I noticed a hole for the cotter pin! Oh Bleep! How is the cotter pin going to fit in there with a key covering the hole?!! So I got to thinking, I can drill out the key from the underside After all, the extra surface area on the unworn part of the shaft was giving it a bit more stability and I didn't want to remove it. Long story short, The drill bit broke, I spent an hour trying to get the broken bit out and ended up driving it through the hole lifting the key out of the slot!

 

[jkoenig]

I've never seen a shaft hold up after having the keyway wallowed out like yours was. I've seen hundreds of misfit keys. Our solution is always to replace the shaft.

Good luck with it. You may want to budget for it in the future.

 

[walls00000]

Reset! I cleaned out the dried JB Weld from the slot, and cut another key to fit so the hole is exposed. Here's a pic showing the play in the shaft after the JB Weld was removed

Here is JB Weld glue job number 2

All in all, I'm pretty impressed with JB Weld (so far) I was concerned that it might be impossible to remove given the use of the word "weld" but it's pretty much just epoxy albeit a strong epoxy. And now on with the u-joint

 

[walls00000]

With the u-joint attached I checked for play. I couldn't find any recognizable play in the u-joint or on the shaft with the new key. There is a little bit of play in the gear box. Should I be worried (I'm not at the moment)? This is tons better than it was with the worn key. Here's a short video showing the play in the gearbox

I think it looks great with that cotter pin in there!

 

[walls00000]

I greased the u-joints, assembled the gearbox to the piece of the mule drive that attaches to the tractor (without the auger at the moment!). I always baste the bolts in never seize on re-assembly.

As I was doing this, I recall reading this post about PTO belt alignment and how the 82 series engine is not mounted parallel to the frame. I hadn't noticed any misalignment before (I'd been chewing up belts like they were candy, but they were the wrong belts and the wrong pulley . . . I digress). but figured I'd check anyway. Having the snow thrower frame separated from the snow thrower, I figured this was the perfect time to check the alignment.

Go figure . . . Its off by a few degrees . . . definitely less than 90˚. I recall @cmiller mentioned his measurement was ~3.5-4.5˚. As a remedy, @mgonitzke made tapered washer spacers to attach the sliding mounting plate. That got it aligned ~2˚. I'm trying a slightly different variation on the same theme . . . I made larger spacers to mount the gear box to the sliding plate so the movement on the plate is not changed at all. Here are some pics . . .

I'm a bit surprised at how close the belt is to the gear box housing when it just hangs freely like that. Essentially, I'm going to need to get the pulley just about all the way up the shaft.

Just now I'm checking my angle against the picture of @mgonitzke 's shims and it looks like he shimmed the top one where I needed to shim the bottom one which leads me to believe there might be something wrong. I noticed this assembly pivots on the quick attach pins and bolts to the frame in with two bots. The slots where these bolts go are pretty shot which allows the thrower to sag a bit and increases the angle. I need to do something to tighten that play up a bit, but perhaps it is the sag that is throwing out this angle. I was all happy until I revisited that shim pic! Curious what others have to say.

 

[walls00000]

Next issue, and I'm rather stumped on this one. I finally was able to get the assembly situated in a position where I could apply some force to get the pulley on (silent cheer!)

- it doesn't stand up on its own and it is just awkward to work with. The solution was to open my vice and sit the mounting bolts on the vice jaws and tighten just a tiny bit to keep it snug. Here's the question, How in the world do I get that press fit pulley on the shaft? I tried heating it on the stove - got it to about 400˚F, ran out to the garage where it was about 35˚, and it doesn't want to budge. I tried tapping lightly with a hammer and I wasn't getting anywhere. I let it cool and started typing. Any ideas? Probably not enough heat? Here are a few pictures of how it sits in the vice

 

[walls00000]

I've never seen a shaft hold up after having the keyway wallowed out like yours was. I've seen hundreds of misfit keys. Our solution is always to replace the shaft.

Good luck with it. You may want to budget for it in the future.

Yeah I expected to hear that at some point. a new shaft and a new drive gear are going on the list.

 

[mgonitzke]

JBcan'tWeld is not going to hold up on that shaft...only way to save it without getting a new one is to cut a new keyway 180 degrees off of the existing one.

While "strong" for an epoxy, JBcan'tWeld is a small fraction of the strength of the shaft you are trying to repair.

 

[dgeary]

Next issue, and I'm rather stumped on this one. I finally was able to get the assembly situated in a position where I could apply some force to get the pulley on (silent cheer!) View attachment 152536View attachment 152537- it doesn't stand up on its own and it is just awkward to work with. The solution was to open my vice and sit the mounting bolts on the vice jaws and tighten just a tiny bit to keep it snug. Here's the question, How in the world do I get that press fit pulley on the shaft? I tried heating it on the stove - got it to about 400˚F, ran out to the garage where it was about 35˚, and it doesn't want to budge. I tried tapping lightly with a hammer and I wasn't getting anywhere. I let it cool and started typing. Any ideas? Probably not enough heat? Here are a few pictures of how it sits in the vice

If you are referring to the drive pulley for the input shaft, it should just slide on even if both pulley and shaft are the same temperature. It's held in place with a set screw. It should not be a press fit.

 

[Doug Rusk]

Ya I don't know why it would need to be press fit. You don't want it too loose as that caused the wallowed key way probably. But it shouldn't need to be press fit either. You want to fit the key and shaft to pulley so it just slips on. Start with no key in the shaft and see what your fit is. If it slips on the you need to carefully file the key until it just slips on with maybe a slight resistance. I too would be concerned the jb weld won't last long.

 

[jdrong]

Whether installing a new input shaft in the gear box or not I would drill a second hole in the driveshaft yoke 90 degees off the original set screw, tap that for a second set screw. This modification seems to have worked for me. I always had a problem with the single set screw somehow working lose even with Loctite on it.
I definitely would not try to press the pulley on. The snap rings holding the input shaft in place may not hold up to that type of pressure. I would take a wild guess that the end of input shaft is somehow damaged or mushroomed.

 

[craybartholow]

With the u-joint attached I checked for play. I couldn't find any recognizable play in the u-joint or on the shaft with the new key. There is a little bit of play in the gear box. Should I be worried (I'm not at the moment)? This is tons better than it was with the worn key. Here's a short video showing the play in the gearbox
View attachment 152529
I think it looks great with that cotter pin in there!

Why don't you use the JB Weld where the Carter key is I think with the torque that is produced by the gearbox that t cotter pin is going to break off I had the same problem with the shaft going from the engine to the transmission and it egged out the hole so bad I had to replace the transmission on the 782d I have a 48 inch snow blower and I'm looking for a new shaft to replace the one that I've lost anybody have an old snow thrower that they junk for parts anyway good job on the Carter PIN and shaft repair

 

[mgonitzke]

Why don't you use the JB Weld where the Carter key is I think with the torque that is produced by the gearbox that t cotter pin is going to break off I had the same problem with the shaft going from the engine to the transmission and it egged out the hole so bad I had to replace the transmission on the 782d I have a 48 inch snow blower and I'm looking for a new shaft to replace the one that I've lost anybody have an old snow thrower that they junk for parts anyway good job on the Carter PIN and shaft repair

The shaft is keyed...the torque goes through the shaft key, not the COTTER key. The COTTER key doesn't do anything other than perhaps keep the shaft key in place and the yoke on the shaft if the setscrews loosen. Putting JBCan'tWeld in there won't do anything. This is not in any way like the spirol pin on the transmission input shaft coupler.

If you are looking for parts for something, start your own thread. You will get more people that might have what you need to see it. That and it's not nice to hijack people's unrelated threads...

 

[jkoenig]

JBcan'tWeld is not going to hold up on that shaft...only way to save it without getting a new one is to cut a new keyway 180 degrees off of the existing one.

You can try 120 degrees out. I know a guy who used to cut three on all of his 1" shafts. This one is a smaller diameter/smaller key though.

 

[walls00000]

Wow again - all great comments thank you all! It sounds like I need to get good at cutting keyways. My Atlas 109 lathe is not yet working as I would like. I have plans to use it potentially as a horizontal mill with a few modifications, but that's another project altogether! I like the additional set screw idea. Thank you for that @jdrong. I believe the u-joint already has 2, the first goes on top of the key, which is how the old key stayed in its place. The second one is 120˚ off the first set screw. The other takeaway for me is that the shaft might be mushroomed. I'll check that first when I get back at it. I do know the original pulley was a `Bleep` to get off, even with a puller. Perhaps the puller mushroomed it? I did check to see the fit of the original and it too didn't slide on at all.

 

[tkhoffman]

Whether installing a new input shaft in the gear box or not I would drill a second hole in the driveshaft yoke 90 degees off the original set screw, tap that for a second set screw. This modification seems to have worked for me. I always had a problem with the single set screw somehow working lose even with Loctite on it.
I definitely would not try to press the pulley on. The snap rings holding the input shaft in place may not hold up to that type of pressure. I would take a wild guess that the end of input shaft is somehow damaged or mushroomed.

Drilling and tapping for an additional set screw is great.. A setscrew on top of the existing set screw acts as a jam nut. This has worked for me on a mower I own.