Help! Cub LT1045 riding mower hydrostatic drive when wacko!

[Pilot]

Cruising along, first mowing of the year and suddenly forward movement stopped dead like it had hit a wall. Smoke billowed from under the deck area, but cleared when I shut off the engine. Then I could hear a whirring noise from the rear end which continued for maybe 2 minutes or so. Obviously something was spinning pretty fast when something broke. When things calmed down I fired up the engine, it started normally but no go forward or backward. Something obviously broke in the hydrostatic drive system.

So, I know nothing about hydrostatic systems.
Are they easy to work on?
Need special tools?
Are we talking Many hundreds of $$ or thousands of $$ to replace the whole hydrostatic system?
Is it time to sell the engine and anything else & replace it?

 

[tomplum]

I would guess that you have broken the traction belt is all. The noise was one of the 3 idlers still rolling around. Time to pop the deck and have a look. And no, you do want to be servicing your hydro...

 

[JRobyn]

There is an EPIC thread on TBN regarding rebuilding the Cub HST drives.

http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/parts-repairs/164892-tufftorq-k46-repair-guide-pictures.html

 

[mjw357]

The drive belt and the fan/pulley on the rear hydro unit died on my LT1050 last fall. Fan/pulley was about $15 if I remember, belt was under $50. The tricky part was getting the pulley off of the engine crankshaft. Its just a bolt/key arrangement but after a few years it gets kinda rusted on there.

 

[Pilot]

Yup, you guys were right, it is the drive belt. And some videos on YouTube show how to replace the belt. Thanks for your input!