Ride on mower diff

[Muddog]

G'day to all, Here is a quick one for ya, Will a diff form a ride on mower do the job in a 6x6? or will an zero turn mower diff wold do?

Cheers
Kev

[thebuggyman1]

I'm sure they would work fine in the original gearing, but you'd be limited to 6-7mph.
If you geared them up it would use much more hp, create much more heat, and really reduce the life of the unit.

[North Country Tough]

G'day to all, Here is a quick one for ya, Will a diff form a ride on mower do the job in a 6x6? or will an zero turn mower diff wold do?

Cheers
Kev

My only concerns with that plan is that although any open style differential can be skid steered the torque and shearing forces being put on the transmission/diff are great,the case comes under some pretty high torque and twisting loads a case failure in the type of diff you are considering is likely,they were not designed with this type of load in mind,best to find a old argo tranny or better yet a T 20.N.C.T

[LarryW]

I tried it once with a tecumseh/peerless transaxle. I geared it higher by putting a bigger sprocket on the transaxle axles running to the smaller sprockets on the aatv axles. The ratio around 1:3.5. It stripped all the teeth on the spider gears in like 15-20 minutes. But gearing it that way put extra torque on the differential. If you geared it up by spinning the transaxle faster it wouldn't put so much torque on the differential and it may last. That way the transaxle speed would be same as ground speed. Im sure spinning the transaxle faster would be ok because lawnmower racers do it. But the ones I have seen have grease in them, not oil. And no bearings. All bushing. So not sure how well they would hold up to higher rpm. That is for all aluminum cased gear drive transaxles that I have seen anyways. If I were to try it again I would go with an older cast iron cased transaxle. I would probably gear it to stay around the stock lawnmower speed.

[lt250rdude]

I would agree with Larry. I used tecumseh/peerless transaxles in racing mowers before. They are not very durable, broke many brand new ones within a few hours, more than one broke within 20-30mins. I was running high input shaft speeds though, probably 3-4k rpm sometimes up to 6k. Also the output shafts are only like 3/4 inch thick. No bearings.