Mower Deck Repair - Front Wheel Mounts

[Don52]

We visited my cousin in Cincinnati Ohio over Memorial day. The front two wheels of the deck on his self propelled Toro mower were floppy with the bottom splaying out (negative camber). The design part of the problem was the that housing had a large slot in it that weakened it and they only used two screws to attach the adjuster plate to the housing. The failure was that a tab around one of each of the bottom screws broke off from the housing. This put a lot of stress on the adjuster plate when it was supported by just one screw, which caused the adjuster plate to crack and bend. The application part of the problem is that my cousins lawn has a lot of roots in it that puts a lot of load on the front wheel mounts.

My solution was to use my cousins oxyacetylene torch to weld the broken tab back to the deck and straighten up the adjuster plate and weld up the crack. The smallest tip that my cousin had #3 Smith tip which was a little too large. I would have also preferred a 1/16" rod as opposed to the 3/32" rods which he had, but I used what he had. We also added two more screws on each side for a total of four to attach each adjuster plate to the housing.

1. Bent Adjuster Plate
No

Don

[wayne50]

Good job. Enjoyed the pictures.