Clutch...what is it good for?

W5FL · Jun 28, 2000

Bird,

If you think about it strictly from a mechanical standpoint then you will see why all the issues on live vs non-live PTO's develop. You come out of the Diesel engine with a single shaft from the crankshaft. Now if you treat it like a car and put a clutch in the line, when you push in the clutch, everything including the PTO will stop. Now it really gets complicated. You want all of that power to go past the clutch, so you can engage the PTO while the tractor is not moving. Now you have to get a second shaft (with a second clutch) past the first clutch or you have to have a PTO clutch that is separate from the vehicle clutch. Since tractors were always pretty straightforward mechanically, these concepts proved to be difficult and solved with "dual clutches" or just let the PTO stop when the tractor stopped.

Interesting what we take for granted when we just want the pto shaft independent of the tractor, isn't it. /w3tcompact/icons/smile.gif

JimAStewart · Jun 29, 2000

Bird,
You mention dual clutch systems here, which brought to mind another question. My L2250 has a dual clutch, but both PTO and tranny are engaging at the same time. I thought initially that the PTO stage had failed, but I think that when a clutch fails, either it burns out, and the PTO wouldn't turn, or the springs fail, and again the PTO wouldn't turn. I'm hoping that I can just adjust the PTO stage of my clutch and get some of the dual effect from my clutch. Does this make sense? I have replaced auto clutches before, but never had to deal with a dual clutch, so I'm not sure my logic is correct...
Thanks

Bird · Jun 29, 2000

JImAStewart, Sorry, but now you're plumb out of my area of knowledge. Anything I told you would be nothing more than a wild guess. All I know about the two stage clutches is how to use it (and darned little experience even with that)./w3tcompact/icons/frown.gif

Bird

gordon · Jun 29, 2000

The past couple of weeks have brought some pretty good thunder storms here. Bad storm=downed trees and limbs made a pretty good bit of money cutting them up. Then the worst happened my father in law calls and says he has a limb down on one of his sheds.

I go to his house the next day and eye up the tree growing at a heavy angle and all major limbs on the low side right over his shed. Had to use the belt , climb , chunk and rope the major limbs down. Got the rope tied to the top of the tree and getting ready to drop it. Some guy walks up and says is this your shed? I replied why--he says he's cut alot of trees and this one is going to fall right on the shed even with a rope on it. A challange huh ok I take my scrench out of my pocket and throw it on the ground and reply to him thats where I'm going to make the tree land. So all the neighbors are watching and I go to town on the tree it falls perfect. I walk over and pick up the scrench-the trunk landed a foot from it and say to this unknown man I must be getting rusty. But it was a damn hard fall trunk was already cracked so all in all it went perfect my good deed of the day was done now I could go make some more money.
Gordon