Do you have some knowledge in how Kioti HST works?
My Kioti CK30 HST creeps forward or backward when you let off the rocker pedal. There are threads littered with diagnoses, none of which seem to clearly fix the issue. Some blame the HST, others point to lubricating where the the pedal mech enters the transmission, others claim damper replacement... I did some trials myself to see if I can isolate the issue. There are three components I played with:
a. HST
b. Damper (orange in image below) - this controls the rate of pedal return from fwd/reverse
c. Centering spring (blue in image below) - this centers the pedal to neutral when you step off the pedal
View attachment 649430
1. Normal operating mode, with orange damper and blue centering spring working together
On a flat if you let off the pedal it just snaps back to neutral. But when the transmission is under load, such as going up a hill, the pedal is more firmly held (I call it "loaded) in the fully extended position and requires a tap on the pedal the opposite way to get it to neutral, but it will still creep. You have to keep tapping it gently fwrd/reverse to find neutral. It's dangerous, so let's see if I can narrow down the problem...
2. Removed both the blue centering spring and orange damper:
Some have said that the HST has a role in centering to neutral so I wanted to see if this was the case by removing everything connected to the pedal. Press forward and it just stays there. Press reverse and it stays there there. It just flops back and forth between positions - there is NO resistance, and therefore no feeling the HST has any responsibility for returning to center. Consistent with #1, when going up a hill the pedal is "loaded" ()))more firmly held in the fwd position) but it takes just a tap harder to push it back to neutral than when unloaded, as in on a flat.
3. Removed Blue centering spring but kept the orange damper attached:
If you put the pedal to reverse and release, the damper pushes the pedal to the forward position. This seems odd. Since the pedal just flops fwd/reverse when there is no damper I would expect the damper to just keep the pedal at whatever position you put it in and it just gives the pedal some resistance when doing so. I found this odd and potentially wrong.
4. Removed the orange damper, but kept the blue centering spring attached:
Snaps back to neutral on flat ground. On a hill, it takes a few seconds for it to pull it out of it "loaded" state, as the pedal is slowly pulled from this position to center. If you take your foot off from full fwrd, you can watch the pedal slowly return to center. It does not do this quick enough (4sec), but once it does, it's in neutral, and does not creep. This seemed like a good sign.
My takeaways from all of this is that the creeping is not an issue with the HST but is an issue with the orange damper/blue centering spring. But I don't see how the damper/centering spring work together to have more force to pull the pedal back when it's "loaded" and then less force when it's not. I would say the blue centering spring needs to be stronger to pull the pedal back when it's "loaded" but that strength would need to be less when it's not "loaded" (i.e. on flat ground)
If anyone has some experience in how this system works, I'd love to hear your input.
