I bet you have a bearing starting to fail. Let me copy/paste a post I wrote over 6000 responses ago when I was asked why we no longer sell the Caroni mower. See below:
We had about a 25% failure rate on rotor bearings (on the drive side) in the first year, and then the race would weld itself to the shaft. It was a 2 hour or more job, plus a special order bearing to fix it. Now we stock the bearings and fix them for people that buy them at TSC, or people that bought them from us in the past. On the ones we sold, we did not charge anyone for a repair, but since the failure was due to inadequate greasing, or at least appeared to be, we would not ask Caroni to warranty it. So we ended up not making any money on them. That being said, if a customer is really diligent and greases the bearings often, they do hold up.
I have used Vrisimo flails for years. I sold one recently that probably had 3000 hours on it. Yes we replaced some bearings and even the rear roller over the years, but they are standard flange bearings and cheap and easy to change. So with the problems we were having on some of the Caroni's and the great luck we had with Vrisimo, we just decided to drop the Caroni and sell a commercial grade unit. Plus at about the same time TSC opened in our town and they sell Caroni. They buy in much higher volume, so our profit margin would have had to shrink. Combine all the factors, and it was time to drop Caroni.
As far as use, the Caroni has a rather small and noisy gearbox and if used for a couple of hours it will vent a fair bit of gear lube out of the gearbox. The Rears, Dandle, Alamo, and Vrisimo mowers just make a humming sound and generally don't vent much gear lube.
Just to be clear though, with good care, it's hard to beat a Caroni in a non-commercial application. They certainly are NOT poor qualtiy, they just aren't made for guys that mow all day every day like in orchards.
