dodge man
Super Star Member
I've never really been happy with the way the HST pedal returns on my BX2350 since it was new. It just doesn't retrun to the neutral position in a timely manner, and its gotten worse over the last couple of months. Most of the time I just lift it to nuetral with my toe, but today I was dumping gravel over the edge of a steep ravine, and it seemed stupid to keep fighting this.
There is a adjustment that is shown in the manual but it says take it to the dealer. I adjusted it anyway and had done the same in the past and it didn't really help. I greased the fighting a lot, didn't help. I studied the linkage and I wondered what would happen if you disconnected the damper. I took the linkage apart and left the damper off. The first thing that was apparent when I took the linkage apart was the pedal was free and wasn't binding and greasing it hadn't made any difference. I left the damper off, but it was only a little better. I then changed the adjustment, which is a vertical screw that is tied into the large return spring. I cranked it all the way to the top. This was a huge improvment. With the damper off, and the adjustment cranked all the way to the top, it stoped in much more postitive way. The 2350 series had the dreaded sudden stop in reverse. This might be a little worse with the damper off, but not really. It does stop quicker going forward.
A couple of observations. Both before and after I took the damper off, the pedal just doesn't return as well when you only have it down about a 1/3 of the way or less. It returns much better if you have it most of the way down. It all seems to return better in low range, but probably because you have the pedal down futher. There is a large return spring, a little bigger around then your thumb. In my opinion, the spring should be shorter so it has more pull when the pedal is near nuetral. I think if the spring had more tension, but was a little smaller, this might also help with the sudden stop in reverse.
After taking the damper off, it seems like a useless item. It doesn't seem to really help with the sudden stop in reverse, and it seems to hang the pedal up when going forward. Removing it seems like an improvement, but it could also be worn out.
I also noticed the pedal seems to stick when going up a hill. It seems like when the HST is loaded hard going up a hill, it tends to not allow the pedal to return as easy.
I suspect a lot of what I see being wrong with the linkage is what was improved on the newer versions of the BX. I think if I had a way to change the return spring out and make it shorter, smaller, bigger, etc, I could improve on it with several different trials. The problem is its really hard to get at and I don't have the time or patiences to mess with it.
There is a adjustment that is shown in the manual but it says take it to the dealer. I adjusted it anyway and had done the same in the past and it didn't really help. I greased the fighting a lot, didn't help. I studied the linkage and I wondered what would happen if you disconnected the damper. I took the linkage apart and left the damper off. The first thing that was apparent when I took the linkage apart was the pedal was free and wasn't binding and greasing it hadn't made any difference. I left the damper off, but it was only a little better. I then changed the adjustment, which is a vertical screw that is tied into the large return spring. I cranked it all the way to the top. This was a huge improvment. With the damper off, and the adjustment cranked all the way to the top, it stoped in much more postitive way. The 2350 series had the dreaded sudden stop in reverse. This might be a little worse with the damper off, but not really. It does stop quicker going forward.
A couple of observations. Both before and after I took the damper off, the pedal just doesn't return as well when you only have it down about a 1/3 of the way or less. It returns much better if you have it most of the way down. It all seems to return better in low range, but probably because you have the pedal down futher. There is a large return spring, a little bigger around then your thumb. In my opinion, the spring should be shorter so it has more pull when the pedal is near nuetral. I think if the spring had more tension, but was a little smaller, this might also help with the sudden stop in reverse.
After taking the damper off, it seems like a useless item. It doesn't seem to really help with the sudden stop in reverse, and it seems to hang the pedal up when going forward. Removing it seems like an improvement, but it could also be worn out.
I also noticed the pedal seems to stick when going up a hill. It seems like when the HST is loaded hard going up a hill, it tends to not allow the pedal to return as easy.
I suspect a lot of what I see being wrong with the linkage is what was improved on the newer versions of the BX. I think if I had a way to change the return spring out and make it shorter, smaller, bigger, etc, I could improve on it with several different trials. The problem is its really hard to get at and I don't have the time or patiences to mess with it.
