Craftsman off road tractor

well im figuring things out on this forum

Well this is a view from the side of my mower, as you see there is no hood at the moment and its slightly muddy.
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this next pic is the front of the engine, its dirty but i have cleaned it since ive taken the pic.
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well this one is blury but its the transaxel as you can see, now this tranny makes a weird clicking noise, is that normal or somthing wore out
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i was thinking this tire would do better than my current wheels, i just need a 5 bolt hub, i should of taken the hubs of the tractor i got the tires off of but i didn't think anything about that.
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i don't know if you can tell in this pic but, if you can you can see how much better the tire on the right is than the left, what i was planning to do is put the bigger tire on the rear and the rear on there now on the front, but i need to drill a short and not to big hole on the front spindles and thread it to put a bolt in rather than welding since i don't have a welder. I want one though
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im not done perfecting it yet but its a start, my gas pedal was once the throttle, and the bracket is actually a track bar from an old steel window. but i need to exten the little stubb of the pedal
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ok this is my bracket (which im not done cutting the flat steel you see behind it) for the snow plow when it snows but idk if im going to get any more snow, i live in southern ohio so idk maybe maybe not, but it works and is use full
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well thats all for now tell me what you all think about it so far and actually my lg shine cell phone doesn't do that bad with pictures,

is that an LT4000? I have one like that. its gettin there. Welders are great too have almost essential.

yea really, i also have a go kart with a 5hp briggs i can get going 35 40 with it, but i can't go off road like i can on this thing, also do you think that tire will do good the larger one. also would anyone know where i can get 5 bolt hub for that rim? its off of a old 1970 somthing john deere tractor

quads have em

if i cant find one i was thinking about going to my grandpa's house and fabricate one, or have him make one at work, he machined and welded my sprocket on my go kart, but i think it will be bad @Ss if i put those tires on it, they are kinda large for the tractor i may have to cut some of the fender but if not its cutting it close.

i have quad tires on my tractor. It never gets stuck in the mud and not too bad in the snow . they were 100$ each witch was like 3 days work

Clicking from the trans isnt normal ... youd hear a lil bit of gear whirr if anything.

I know my GT craftsmans and 69 wheelhorse have 5 lug wheels ( ironically will fit either one- i put my WH wheels on my GT6000) - the craftsmans are splined to the axle, while the WH has a keyed hub - cept both are 1" axles.....

I know northern tools has 4 bolt ATV hubs- theyre like $40 each tho- i bot 2 keyed and two tapered bering for my golf kart rims- which are going on my wheelhorse mod.

I know trailer hubs are 5 bolt- cept they run berings- might be better to have the pair machined.....


That looks like my 85 LT12 - thats the one i trashed the trans on when i swapped pulleys w/o adding oil/grease to it.

Check out Fearlessfronts rockcrawler build- hed running rear tires on the front....

The front hubs on those ATV flanges are 3/4" - the rear keyed hubs are 1" ....

Transmissions are cake now- after i cracked open that one out of the weedeater tractor its like " wow that easy!" well cept for the kleen kut- thats a pain..... the MTD transaxles are like empty inside- basically just 4 main gears and then the pinion gears on the axles....

On normal trans, only thing to watch for is the shift detent ball n spring....

Engines on the other hand are scarey.....im sorta afraid to actually fix one.

Nice looking machine! These craftsmans are fun to work on... Lots of room to put stuff. If your tranny is clicking, it may have a broken tooth somewhere. It's probably still drivable, but start looking for a parts machine, it's always nice to have some backup.

I rebuilt my engine, it was intresting. I was actually suprized that there wern't more moving parts in there. To me, engines make sence, trannys are a strange animal!

Yeah i have like 4 motors that could be rebuilt in my parts shed- mostly 12HP's - one that possibly could work w/o opening it....ive cracked alot of em open, theres alot of weird stuff in there to me....


When my craftsmans trans crapped out, luckily i wasnt at full speed or slowing down- i just had fired it up, put it in first till i got to the street... shifted it to second, popped the clutch and.... stopped dead. - literally in the middle of the street ( was a side street) - ran up to the shed n grabbed another tractor cause i couldnt even push it off the road - was locked up completely- used a ratchet strap, and had to drag the thing all the way thru the yard - luckily i had a spare transmission, but that was the end as a modifed hot rod for it.

Gave no warning or anything , just locked up..... i cracked it open later n found about 5 of the main gear and couple of pinion teeth all broken off and lodged in the gear area.

ok more update no pics yet but, heres whats happening.
i could not get my giant pulley off the thing and i pulled the input shaft out of the trans, so i said fck, so i tore the case of the trans to find out i popped off a snap ring,
but i also found out there was a sht ton of metal shavings on the bolt holes on the brake caliper, i looked closley and found out the gears managed to not get any shavings, i don't know what this person did but must of taped the hole out or somthing.
so im going to clean the tranny case and gears, and re grease everything or should i use fluid? the trans isn't really all that sealed,
now i need to put the pulley with the input shaft stuck to it, in to a hydraulic press and press it out, then i need to make a hub for the smaller pulley, i think its either 5 or 6 but with big tires it shall fly,

also is it hard at all to mess with the shift key and gears?, also whats the chain in there for, revers? if so than my trans is a 6 speed cause theres 6 gears and a chain,
oh and i also found out that i have a broken piece of the case up front on a bracket, wonder how that happend?

i totaly agree with fearlessfront. ive rebuild my craftsmans motor twice (like all apart) and my vikings once and a couple other motors too (all briggs engines). I understand mostly every thing on em but trannys on the other hand... Im scared shitless to open the one on my crafftsman. i dont want to fuck it up cause its my only mudden tractor right now and i can go 3 days with out a romp

oh and forgot the trans is a FOOTE 3865

well its actually a peerless 930 series 6 speed, these trans series go from 3 to 7 speeds

also what type of grease can i use other than bentonite for the transaxle gears?
can i use red wheel bearing grease? i know that stuff works great.

Yeah- i used lucas oil high temp wheel bering grease along with red lucas grease from the grease gun in the MTD - bennonite is like a one shot only grease- the funny thing is they must only put a few ounces in each trans- cause there isnt very much inside - yd think theyd pack it full.... on the other hand they probably want to sell you another tractor when the trans locks ....


gear oil tends to weep past openings in the case ( no oil seals) - even filling it only half full. I used lucas oil additve in my modded murray, it held together after a bunch of high speed runs- stuff sticks like glue to parts.

Only transmissions id be afraid to open are hydro static and the ones on my GT's - both those are nitemares. Y haveta watch for the detent ball and spring when you tear an average trans apart- usually theres an access hole ( with a screwed in plug ) right above it- take those out and keep em safe- when its ready to go back together- just drop em down the access hole n put the plug in.

Actually small metal shavings inside the trans ( unless a gear came apart) are allright- since its grease n no fluid- itll stay put - transmissions on lawntractors arent super high tolerance built - theres some leeway and slop in em - if they were highly machined- theyd be a whole lot more to buy.

Usually since the caliper bolts are steel and the trans is aluminum, the two are disimilar metals- and corrode- most times they break when trying to remove em ( had that happen) - but sometimes theyll come out easy- a good way to prevent breaking em is to use a dab of never seize on the bolts - specially if it sees alot of mud n water.

well thanks, ill probably pack the crap out of it cause i don't want any gears running dry, the grease in there wasn't doing so much and was kinda hard in spots. ill probably use the red bearing grease since that gease is a high pressure and temp grease used in car wheel bearings, and that benonite crap is 18 bucks for idk what even size of amount. and what sadden's me is the trans is made by techumseh, does briggs make any, if so i bet they be bad @ss. but my trans is cake to work on. i bet hydro trans are confusing as hll. or the trans out of my junk john deere was really confusing, but thanks for the reply, im going to be cleaning out the trans today hopfully

im thinking of taking the tranny out of my craftsman and puttin the grease in. before i do that i just got a couple of questions

1 what is the exact name of the grease (red bearing grease)?

2 do i havta clean all the old grease out before i put the new stuff in?

yeah thats true, i don't know where i would find another tractor.
but my trans is good, i had to use a hydraulic press to get the input shaft out of the stock pullley, so im going to have a hub made for the new pulley, and see if i can't make some hubs for my rims too. also i didn't get red bearing grease but i got this different kind of wheel bearing grease, its high temp, high pressure, not that my trans is going to be hauling a truck or anything, but im going to get some pics of the before then and after of my trans, so people can see whats inside and what not.

ok this is the tear down and rebuild of the transaxle or not really rebuild but deep clean and packed with fresh better grease



Ok these are the shift gears, 1-6 and revers(chain) before i cleaned them

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Ok this is the rear end without the wheels and trans assembly
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and this is underneath the rear end without trans
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this is the trans housing before i cleaned it
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ok this is the trans housing being cleaned and soaked.

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ok this is the pulley im going to use, its 5in i think but its WAY smaller than the stock pulley, so i should pick up some speed but be able to have lots of torque, with out major engine bogg

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well the only thing else after putting back together the trans that i need is the brake rotor and pad and i think the push pin.
also i was thinking about using fearless idea on the lowering the front axle for more articulation cause the trails i like to go on have lots of uneaven spots, and the only reason why i would use this idea is cause my frame twist too much and wheels lift off the ground at times and i have no traction or control over somthings, also what are the ways to lock a differential list me as many as there is and ones that work great.
well tell me what you all think so far

arild365: 1. Any type of heavy duty wheelbering grease is fine- i just get high speed/temp grease for packing front wheel berings.

2. Yes id clean it out as best as possible - as i recall the grease in my craftsman was pretty nasty looking- the grease from my kleen kut looked like baby crap....


motorhead 45102 : I bot most mine on craigslist in my area- some i got for free from people i know - i go after dead n junk ones - going after runners will be a whole lot more.... surprisingly most my 'junkers' arent really that bad- lil work and they run, mow n drive fine. I did get a few on the local online freecycle- only stipulation is you need to give something away to get something free tho....