New B2150 to me PTO question ???

xtriggerman · Sep 6, 2018

I just bought a B2150 with a belly mower. It starts and runs great but I have a simple question. It seems the mid & rear PTO's are hard geared together. Am I right about that? The selector is 748 rpm, 0 rpm and 540 rpm. The problem is, for years I ran a comet pressure washer pump off the 540 PTO on my Massy 1010. I rigged a nice gear box up drive to 3600rpm to the pump input shaft and find its the only way I want to spray water. Now enter the B2150.... spinning the deck blades for nothing while I only want the rear PTO to run my pump is senseless. I don't mind pulling the deck drive shaft off the mid PTO if I have to but even with that idea, I cant figure out how the darn U joint pulls off the mid spline shaft. Is the yoke collar suppost to slide back to the shaft housing, releasing the yoke to slide forward & off? That collar has been on there for decades and seems pretty fixed in place. Whats my next move?
THANKS

ryan08 · Sep 7, 2018

I have a BX and not a B, however it would seem like the B would be the same. You can switch the PTO selector to run just the rear or both.
The sleeve collar should slide allowing shaft removal. Maybe it just needs a good drink of PB Blaster to loosen up.

xtriggerman · Sep 7, 2018

The PTO selector has 3 positions that I can easily click into, down for 748on both, middle is stop on both and up is 540 on both. The selector absolutely does not move in any other position...... God knows i'v pushed, pulled and yanked for some other click and that's all it has! just whats on the sticker there.

BubbaJr · Sep 7, 2018

Try moving the tractor ever so slightly while trying to move the lever until the gears line up, then you should be able to shift it.

Joe

Alan W. · Sep 7, 2018

I had a B2150 for awhile. Great tractor. Sorry I let it go.
But to your question yes the ptos are tied together. Both are engaged or disengaged. Will not run independant of each other. I had to be careful when bushhogging in tall grass as the mid pto would wrap up with grass and damage the seal.

xtriggerman · Sep 8, 2018

Alan W. said:
I had a B2150 for awhile. Great tractor. Sorry I let it go.
But to your question yes the ptos are tied together. Both are engaged or disengaged. Will not run independant of each other. I had to be careful when bushhogging in tall grass as the mid pto would wrap up with grass and damage the seal.

THANK YOU..... I just had to hear it from some one who had a B2150. Odd as it may be. Now I can concentrate on trying to get the yoke off the shaft.

JWR · Sep 8, 2018

ryan08 said:
I have a BX and not a B, however it would seem like the B would be the same. You can switch the PTO selector to run just the rear or both.
The sleeve collar should slide allowing shaft removal. Maybe it just needs a good drink of PB Blaster to loosen up.

No, not the case Ryan. The B2150 has 3 positions for the PTO -- OFF (center), 748 RPM or 640 RPM as the triggerman said. It is NOT like the BX with selectivity as to which PTO is running. I have 2 - B2150's and one BX2200.

Triggerman: I suggest just pulling the short little mid-pto driveshaft off the mower deck during times when you have much other use for the rear PTO. Yes, the collar on the U-joint either rotates or slides toward the front of the tractor in order to release the large B-B's that serve as the locks for the U-joint on the mid-PTO shaft. It should not be hard to remove even if it has been on there for ages. If it is you may have to pry forward behind the release collar / u-joint with a large screwdriver, etc.. The mower drive shaft also has to telescope some for the U-joint to pull off the mid-PTO shaft. Try a squirt tube on your handy WD-40 can and get some kind of lube inside the splined telescoping shaft. [Worst case you can loosen the deck attachment points and pull the whole deck forward a couple of inches which will force the splined shaft to slide apart some. If you do that, lube the splines while they are partially apart.] It may take some effort but you really have no choice but to solve that on/off of the mid-PTO shaft eventually -- may as well do it now. It is tight for elbow room under there and you need Hercules strong hands too sometimes but the more you take it on and off the easier it gets from both a mechanical standpoint AND a familiarity standpoint. Runningthe deck a little sometimes helps to free up the shaft if it is dry and stubborn.

BY THE WAY, I find the 2 speed PTO really nice on the B2150. I can run at rated engine rpm while mowing with the 640 setting OR I can lower the engine rpm (down to roughly 2000 rpm) and run the pto at the 748 setting. This allows me to run the tractor in 2nd gear rather than low and not be going too fast for a lot of mowing situations. Flexibility.

I repeat: that u-joint yoke collar will NOT slide back toward the rear for release. It EITHER rotates for release OR slides forward, one of the two.

gimmodog · Sep 8, 2018

a spline collar usually has 3 balls that sit in the indention circle of the PTO to hold the shaft on. Those balls will get rusty and not move if not greased properly therefore you cannot get the collar to slide like it should to pull the balls out of the indention circle. Keep soaking it with penetrating oil (aeroKroil is the best there is) to get them unstuck and movable. Using 2 prybars to help move the collar forward will help, just don't use enough force to break the PTO housing

xtriggerman · Sep 9, 2018

Thanks guys.
All your experienced words help a lot in giving me a degree of confidence that I can get it off the shaft. I hope the collar turns rather than pushes forward to the casing. Seems to me if it moves to the casing, there will be hardly any space to get a thin pry bar in between the collar and casing to try and force it back.
I got half a mind to get the nose up in the air on a chain off a lib on a tree so I can squat in front of the darn thing to get it free. Ever since I got bi focals, working on things has not been fun the way it used to be..... Thanks again all!

JWR · Sep 9, 2018

My hindrance is that I am 330 miles from my B2150 with the belly mower. I can't just go out and look. My memory leans strongly to saying that the collar on the U-joint & driveshaft for the deck is the push/pull type, not the rotate type. There are 2 potential "prying" situations:

One is to loosen up the release collar so that it will slide forward toward the front of the tractor about 1/2 inch or so. A large screwdriver should work for that "pry." It could be stuck but I doubt that will even need prying.

The more likely need for prying would be the U-joint reluctance to slide off the splined shaft. In that case you would pry between the u-joint and the blue housing from which the splined shaft protrudes (making sure the release collar is in the released position of course.) And like the other fellow said, make liberal use of the PT Blaster or whatever penetrating oil you like best.

Here is a picture of the mid-PTO splined shaft, naked without the u-joint, shaft, etc.

The deck with the short driveshaft should look like this. You can see the collar and it does not look like the rotating kind to me.

BY THE WAY, this last picture reminded me -- you will need to tie up that end of the drive shaft that you leave on the deck when you are using the rear PTO for other things. Maybe wire, bungy or zip tie, whatever works best for you. When you do that, be darn careful not to get grease from the dangling driveshaft onto that belt. Those belts are extremely durable but grease on them will cause slippage which causes heat which causes failure of the belt.