What have you done with/to your GC Series 2300, 2400, 1700 Tractor TODAY

[hube2]

When I bought my first GC Massey I was going to get the mulching deck.
The sales guy, who I knew from High School, convinced me not to.
The had sold a few of them and nobody was really happy with them.
I forget what the problems were. With the 60" deck I do have I'm not totally pleased either.
Does a nice level cut and all that. However if the grass is taller it does tend to leave a hay row if you don't lift the shield.
Then I have to drive around with the grass catcher and that fills up in no time even though mine is a "commercial" size.

the main issue with the 54" mulching deck for me was that you can't drive over it, you have to drag in and push it to get it under the tractor and lined up. The deck weighs nearly 250#. I could barely to this with a 54" deck that weighed about 125# on my old lawn tractor. I wasn't going to attempt it with something twice the weight. And this is also the reason my dealer recommend against it.

I totally hear ya on the 60", the MF2326. I had that deck, sold it last spring.

I like to mow at 3.75", and it just didn't do great at that height, primarily because there's no other blade option besides those that come on the deck. It needs high lift blades to suck that grass up high enough to get a decent taller cut. Adding to that, there's no mulching option with this deck...again, can't put mulching blades on there, plus the deck itself wouldn't work well with a mulching blade per its design.

With that said, I regret selling it for one main reason: ballast. I had a bunch of backhoe work to do last fall, really noticed a difference not having the deck on to add weight and also lower the center of gravity...tractor was getting spanked around all over the place. It was a mistake to sell that deck, for that alone.

I also like to mow at that height, I think it does a pretty good job as long as you keep the RPMs up. My issue is that I let it go as long as possible between mowings and end up with the hay rows, thinking about mowing more this year, but I would rather not. If I could do it every 10 days it would be perfect, problem with that is I have to work and push it out to a full 2 weeks to do it on the weekends. At 7 days it's barely grown enough to make it worth cutting most of the time.

 

[GeneV]

the main issue with the 54" mulching deck for me was that you can't drive over it, you have to drag in and push it to get it under the tractor and lined up. The deck weighs nearly 250#. I could barely to this with a 54" deck that weighed about 125# on my old lawn tractor. I wasn't going to attempt it with something twice the weight. And this is also the reason my dealer recommend against it.


I also like to mow at that height, I think it does a pretty good job as long as you keep the RPMs up. My issue is that I let it go as long as possible between mowings and end up with the hay rows, thinking about mowing more this year, but I would rather not. If I could do it every 10 days it would be perfect, problem with that is I have to work and push it out to a full 2 weeks to do it on the weekends. At 7 days it's barely grown enough to make it worth cutting most of the time.

I imagine with the stock blades and at taller setting, it would actually mow better with the lawn overgrown....less effort for those low-lift blades to suck the grass blades up.

Yeh, I dunno, but I will say these 54" mulching decks are a bit of a mystery, hardly anybody has them. No youtube vids of them, no reviews. I did however find an older thread here on TBN, one guy with the deck. I'ma go find that thread now, and holla at the dude, see if he's still alive.

 

[cdaigle430]

From my GC1720. The spikes are not long, would worry about them putting on too much side stress if much longer.
So these work ok in dirt, just don't expect miracles.

View attachment 3169672

My GC2410 came with thick rubber pads on one side and teeth on the other.

 

[polarred21]

From my GC1720. The spikes are not long, would worry about them putting on too much side stress if much longer.
So these work ok in dirt, just don't expect miracles.

View attachment 3169672

Here's my 1723 for comparison. Mine looks much cheaper made than what you have. Does yours have grease fittings?

 

[kenmbz]

yes, the pads have grease fittings, similar to the rubber collar ones.

 

[irvingj]

Looks like my 2310 will get some work soon... We've had a weird-weather thing over the past 3 days (!) with wet snow (a little) and freezing rain (a lot). Temps have stayed at or below 32 the whole time, with intermittent, but never completely stopping, light rain or freezing rain.

As a result, today there's at least 1/4" of ice all over everything! Standing outside early this AM, I could hear branches and/or whole trees coming down, about one loud noise every 20 seconds.

So far no branches have hit any vehicles or buildings on my property, but they've come close! Also electricity has remained on...so far. LRB will get busy pushing branches out of the way soon.....

 

[Dmacleo]

pretty similar here, but not as bad. branches that fell are along lawn edge so they can wait. do have crapload of ice in bucket though, will have to fire it up and empty that once weather warms up a touch today.

 

[ray66v]

Much of my lawn will be high enough to need mowing, in the next week or two.

 

[MF RED in MT]

Nice Spring day here, sunny and 87 degrees.

KC

 

[hube2]

I still have weeks before I'll mow, I do not mow or work on the tractor when I need to where a heavy coat unless I'm dealing with snow. I wait until the temp is greater than 60. Not seeing anything like that coming in the next 14 days. And before I mow I need to change the oil, change the hydro fluid and fluid in the front axle, remove and store the blower and FEL, get the deck out, greased up and blades sharpened. I need 2 nice days, on the weekend, to get this done. I'd rather wait an mow a hay field than fart around outside when it's below 60 degrees. I get enough of that in the winter.

Put over 60 hours on the tractor this winter, that is 2 to 3 times the hours I've ever put on it in a single winter and more hours than my average year which is about 50.