G1900 with 54" deck seal problems.

[pap71]

Today after mowing my grass for about an hour I decided to remove the 54" deck from my G1900 and service and clean it. I took the fill plug out of the gear box before removing the drain plug to change the gear oil. There was a good amount of pressure in the gear box. It almost blew the fill plug out of my hand! Heck no wonder the seals are blowing out of these things. I have a bagger on it so I changed the gear oil in thet gear box also. Guess what? The same thing happened!

I would thing these gear boxes would have a vent of some kind but can't find any. Now this was right after I got done mowing so things were hot but I don't think there should have been pressure in the gear boxes. Has anyone else seen this? I will be keeping an eye on those seals!

 

[KYKub]

Hi, pap71. I also have a G1900, but have never taken the gear box plug out while it is hot. I check it occasionally just to make sure oil weeps out if I loosen the plug, but I don't think it's ever been hot when I do. I'll try to remember to check after I mow next, probably Saturday. Jeff

 

[Baby Grand]

Unvented is my preference, if the seals will take it. This usually means a fairly small volume gearbox. Since there is air and oil sealed in the gearbox, as the mix heats up in operation, the pressure rises. When you shut it down and it cools off, the pressure drops back down to approximately ambient. Since you're not cyclically breathing air in and out, there's little to no chance for moisture to get into the gearbox and condensing. That's a real good thing for the oil quality and gearbox life expectancy.

-Jim