Rotary Cutter Bush Hog blade bolt stuck, need ideas

[Newtogreen]

I hope this is the right forum but anyway I have a new used BHTH 72 finish mower and I can't get one of the blades off. The bolt is on there tight. I can get it to turn but the top nut on the spindle starts to turn. I though if I could unscrew the top nut the whole spindle would drop and I could work on it that way but it didn't happen. Any ideas would be helpful. By the way I did try an air inpact tool. Thanks Larry

[schmism]

do the blades turn when you turn the bottom bolt?

i got mine off by wedgeing a 2x4 block upagainst various locations of the deck so the blades wouldnt turn.

worked great for takeing them off.... not so much for tighting them back down

[390GT]

Heat and/or penetrating oil. Also impact tools require high volume as well as pressure, to work at their rated capacity. Short fat air hoses are good for impact tools. Put a wrench on the top nut to keep it from spining. Greg

[rickmacheske]

Mine was really stuck before I put a strong impact wrench on it. I tried heat, penetrating oil, a 3' breaker bar and none of them worked.

[Tact]

I've actually heard somewhere on the forum of someone using "wax" to loosen rusted on nuts and bolts. Try doing a search and you might find it. I believe they heated up the bolt or nut and then applied a candle or wax to the hot area and the wax sucked up into the threads, loosening the bolt or nut.

[Tact]

Here you go:
http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/p...?highlight=wax

[Kubotasrking]

I hope this is the right forum but anyway I have a new used BHTH 72 finish mower and I can't get one of the blades off. The bolt is on there tight. I can get it to turn but the top nut on the spindle starts to turn. I though if I could unscrew the top nut the whole spindle would drop and I could work on it that way but it didn't happen. Any ideas would be helpful. By the way I did try an air inpact tool. Thanks Larry

a little heat should do the trick.

[George2615]

I usually use my impact gun to remove blade bolts. I've also had some bolts the gun won't budge but by hitting / shocking the bolt head a few times with a big hammer then the gun will take it off. The hit seems to loosen the bolt threads that may have a little rust on them.

[SPYDERLK]

Newtogreen, The impact gun is the way to go. For that to work well in your apparently tuf situation you will need to couple some mass rigidly to the spindle for the impacts to work against. Ordinarily the blade is attached well enuf that the spindle wont turn with the blade stationary. If the spindle is turning with blade stationary it is weird and more of a problem. You will have to attach mass rigidly to the pulley somehow. Then the impact, if a good one, will take it off.
larry

[lopezian]

I had a very similar situation with my DR field and brush mower. The blade nut was stuck and the only way to prevent the spindle from turning was to put a wrench on the top nut. The blade mount hole was not keyed so bracing the blade didn't help. Naturally the top bolt would come off but that didn't help me get the blade nut off.

We tried everything - heat, cheater bars, impact wrenches - nothing worked. I hadn't discovered TBN at the time so I didn't know about the hot wax trick or I would have tried that too.

Eventually we used a torch to cut the nut off and then we saw what the problem was. Somewhere along the line I must have really hit a rock that damaged the spindle that the nut was screwed onto. The threads were so damaged that there was NO WAY that bolt was going to come off. I ended up replacing the whole spindle and bearings.