Looking for 2003 dk45 front end 4wd parts

leboeuf · Feb 7, 2022

Hello, first post.
This is probably a long shot but I just purchased a 2003 DK45 (in cub cadet 8454ss form) from a shameless individual who had removed 3 of the bevel gears and vertical shafts from the front end after what I assume was some kind of breakage.

Anyway that's water under the bridge and I'd like to get my 4wd system working.
I can't find this 16 tooth bevel gear and I need two of them: DD-T4682-43441
I *think* I bought all the other parts on ccparts.com. We'll see if they pull through and actually have the parts.

Any chance there are any Kioti dealers on here that want to help out someone who just got swindled out of a few grand? Haha

perrypower · Feb 7, 2022

The part number you mentioned is in stock at Kioti. Any Kioti dealer should be able to help you, including us if you so choose.

leboeuf · Feb 7, 2022

And I thought all hope was lost. You have a very nice website and I'll be placing an order shortly.

I see the backlash shims still exist as well! That will save me some trouble. Maybe my first hipshot will work, unless you might know if there is a common starting thickness (I fully understand this probably isn't common knowledge)?

Thank you so much!

perrypower · Feb 7, 2022

If I remember correctly from jobs in our repair shop, we usually order all the shims and end up using only half of them - so no, I don't really have any way of telling you which ones or how many you'll need.

leboeuf · Feb 24, 2022

perrypower said:
The part number you mentioned is in stock at Kioti. Any Kioti dealer should be able to help you, including us if you so choose.

Thanks again!
If anyone is curious here are my shiny new gears. Pretty beefy by my eyes, 3/4" chisel for reference. The loader is tweaked on this thing and I assume the broken front axle is related. Must have been a serious event.

Now just to get this thing shimmed and back together. Then I can get to fixing the things that I knew were not quite right and grafting this free to me backhoe to the back

9" bevel gear in the hubs! I need to get my head out of car/truck sizes and into tractor mode.

leboeuf · Mar 14, 2022

I got this all back together just in time for another round of storms. A 4wd tractor does a lot better in the snow than a 2wd

There wasn't much online about setting these bevel gears up so I figured I'd post my crude methods. I know the widths are not the same between the gear I'm measuring from and the gear doing the actual movement. The width ratios can be worked out; use your best judgement.

For the top bevel gear, I measure the backlash from the bevel gear that interfaces with the wheel gear. On this tractor the top bevel gear can be seated against its shim by pushing the shaft from the bottom of the axle. I tried to get a picture... This ended up with ~9 thou of backlash with an 0.8mm shim on the left and 8 thou with a 1.0mm shim on the right.

For the bevel gear to wheel gear I used caveman techniques... If I were doing this at a period in life where I didn't have 3 young kids, I would turn a shaft to thread into the drive shaft and make/bore/hone a bearing plate to hold the drive shaft for measurement.
Instead I used a nail and some judgement

. It actually went better than it looks, finished with ~10 thou with 1.2mm shim/1.6mm shim L/R.

I went to reassemble and remembered that the caveman who was last in this axle rtv'd the o-rings in place... A standard size 270 o-ring was a little tight but ended up sealing well.

o2batsea · Mar 14, 2022

Boy, I've been in there a few times! I never used any sealant, just the o-rings are plenty. I also find that pulling the top cap off one of the swivel housings is the easiest way to fill the axle with oil, rather than slopping it all over using the filler hole.

RandR10 · Mar 24, 2022

I had a similar experience when I first ran my tractor where a bunch of stuff was missing but it was mostly just the bearings, which are generic, and the seals. The top bearing on the kingpin shaft was about 1/2" undersized on the OD and was just flopping around in the housing. I was just like WTF is this? When I removed the steering arm from the knuckle the knuckle just dropped out of the housing. When I pulled the knuckle apart the inner bearing that holds the ring gear in place was so rusty that the balls just fell out of their races. The "gear oil" in the knuckle housing was a slurry of water, rust and maybe a little bit of oil. It kind of blows my mind because the 4x4 actually still worked, the wheel was just flopping around when I tried to steer, which is the only reason I knew something was seriously wrong. None of the gears were damaged other than a little bit of corrosion. Because they left it leaking so long the knuckle housing filled up with water and the kingpin shaft got really bad pitting on it. Then they left it so long in that state that the sealing collar wore the shaft down so it wouldn't even accept a brand new replacement. Then it looks like they went in there to fix it and just stuck the wrong bearing on there with no seals and gave up. When I started piecing the parts together I didn't have a parts book yet so I was just going off of measurements. I'm glad I came up with one in the middle of that job though because the two piece seal between the upper housing and the steering knuckle would have been impossible to make work without the proper OEM part. I made up a smaller ID press fit collar with the same OD when I repaired it, then as I pressed it on I sealed it with sleeve retainer. I replaced all of the bearings and seals after that and everything basically fell into place. Didn't even have to adjust backlash. It's been working great since then. The other side is weeping oil a little bit so I'll probably do a bearing and seal rebuild on that side sometime in the near future too. It'll be good to get another oil change on it at that point because I'm sure some more of that corrosion I couldn't wire brush off has made its way into suspension in the oil now that I've put a few hours on it in 4x4.

Vegasthemole · Sep 7, 2023

Hello, first post as well,
First off thank you to @leboeuf for posting this. I tried tracking down parts through cub cadet who has them listed as obsolete, without this thread I’d have never figured out that the 8454 was a rebadge kioti.

I’m having a similar issue with my cub cadet 8454 ss, I was able to order the top bevel gear t4682-43442 (I’m told by the salesman this part supersedes t4682-43441) from Nolts power equipment (formerly perry power). It was out of stock but after a short wait I received the gear. My problem is that the gear I received is .156” larger in diameter and .060” taller than the gear I removed, and it won’t fit through the openings of the hub casting. Has anyone had issues with gears from kioti being that far off? I’ll likely reach out to nolts in the morning to see if there is any way we can order another and hope that its tolerance is closer? Any other kioti dealers on here that are interested in helping me out? I’m really just getting to my whits end with this tractor.