Cleaning Under Zero-Turn Deck After Every Session: Really Necessary?

[LittleBittyBigJohn]

if all you are really wanting to mulch is leaves and you are afraid it will not have the power to mulch grass for the rest of the year, you can use a chute blocker. I have used them with success in the past. That way you can have side discharge most of the time and block off the chute when you don't want to just throw clippings out the side. It will not recycle and really "mulch" grass clippings. But, it will hold leaves in long enough to cut them up pretty well. You will get a light windrow on the chute side that you may have to go back over but it will do the job.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

That is an interesting idea.

The only reason I got the mulch kit for the JD was to get rid of--literally--tons of hard little oak leaves that were a nightmare to move and burn. I haven't paid any attention at all to what it does to the grass. Given the poor quality of grass here, I am not shooting for a fancy lawn. I just want to keep it from getting out of hand.

I just checked prices for products that block chutes, and they're right up there with mulching kits, so it seems like a bad idea to buy one. Maybe I could fabricate one.

 

[kozal01]

if all you are really wanting to mulch is leaves and you are afraid it will not have the power to mulch grass for the rest of the year, you can use a chute blocker. I have used them with success in the past. That way you can have side discharge most of the time and block off the chute when you don't want to just throw clippings out the side. It will not recycle and really "mulch" grass clippings. But, it will hold leaves in long enough to cut them up pretty well. You will get a light windrow on the chute side that you may have to go back over but it will do the job.

This is exactly what I do in the fall and spring to deal with leaves. I take the high lift gator blades off and throw on the low lift gators, then close my grass flap when I want to mulch up the leaves, works just as you describe and does a great job. That grass flap is the best thing I bought for my Exmark.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

This is a suggestion I will follow up on. I don't have the new mower yet, so I can't see how hard it is to make a chute blocker. I don't want to pay $300 for a metal flap.

So I guess I could combine this with mulching blades and see what happens.

My leaves are amazing. I piled up tons of them and burned them. They burn for a week or more, and pouring 100 gallons of water into a burning pile has zero effect.

 

[mjonesnh]

That is an interesting idea.

The only reason I got the mulch kit for the JD was to get rid of--literally--tons of hard little oak leaves that were a nightmare to move and burn. I haven't paid any attention at all to what it does to the grass. Given the poor quality of grass here, I am not shooting for a fancy lawn. I just want to keep it from getting out of hand.

I just checked prices for products that block chutes, and they're right up there with mulching kits, so it seems like a bad idea to buy one. Maybe I could fabricate one.

My chute blocking device is a 5/4x6 deck board about 14" long with a hole drilled in each end. rubber tarp straps hooks threw holes in board , other hook in pully covers or 1 of holes in deck from factory. Raise chute and secure with bungee, mount board. works great for me. Had a neighbor that used an old license plate secured with couple of bungee. He seemed happy and said worked fine

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

Hmm...$340, or waste a perfectly good old license plate. I'll have to think it over.

 

[Suburban Plowboy]

This looks bad.

 

[RjCorazza]

You can't beat the convenience of a commercial chute blocker. That said, if you're a good fabricator I see no reason why a similarly easy to use blocker couldn't be made.
I'm not that good a fabricator, so I bit the bullet and bought one.

 

[sandman2234]

Geez. Knives? You must have some serious crud up there in Tennessee. I have never noticed much of anything stuck to my deck here in sizzling Northern Florida.

We seldom mow early morning, but if we do, we are still mowing by the time the grass dries out, so the dry grass should clean under the deck.
Our biggest problem is not wet grass building up under the deck, as much as grass clippings, leaves and such getting caught on top of the deck and rusting it from the top down.
I just brought home a JD mower that had a lot of crud on top of the deck, but it was stored on a concrete slab inside a barn. While it had been sitting for 2 years with that crud on the deck, there is no rust. The mower was covered with a LOT of dust from the horses walking around in the pens adjacent to the barn. Surprisingly, I jumped it off to see if it would spin over, and it did. I splashed a little gas in the carb and it actually started and runs like a top. Automatic tranny wouldn't move, dang it!
Blow the deck off with a leaf blower and store it inside is my suggestion.
David from jax

 

[Cycledude]

I’m a Kubota ZD21 owner, currently a little over 1400 hours on it with very little trouble, still using the original belt, did replace the original starter because it often wasn’t engaging properly , a brand new starter cost less than $100 from Amazon, local Kubota dealer wanted $215 plus my old starter because Kubota supposedly rebuilds them. The brand new one I installed myself so far has been working perfectly .
My local Kubota dealer does sell a mulching kit for the ZD21 but it would cost about $350 and takes about a month to get so I didn’t order it. But I did see one being used to mulch leaves in a county park and it was almost unbelievable was a great job it did grinding up those leaves ! No windrows left when they were done and the ZD21 seemed to run it effortlessly, everything was very dry that day so that probably helped.
I do usually clean the deck inside and outside when I’m done mowing, scraper used to clean the bottom and leaf blower to clean the top.