King Kutter disc is a piece of garbage

[sweettractors]

Spent a little over 20K last week on a new Kubota L3200, King Kutter bush hog and a King Kutter adjustable disc. Today I hooked up the disc. I removed the bolts from the adjustment slide and thought I was going to adjust the disc for full bite. WRONG! Could not even budge either the front or back. Studied it for a while and found that the bolts that attach the flanges across the top and the bottom of the slide rail to each gang were so tight that the flanges were actually bent around the center rail of the disc. Also, on each flange there were pieces of flat stock about 1/2" wide welded on the flanges right up next to where they make contact with the center rail. They were welded so tight against the center rail there was no wiggle room so the discs could be adjusted. So I took the flanges off and ground about an 1/8th of an inch off all eight of these pieces of flat stock and remounted the flanges. If I tightened the nuts on the bolts tight enough I thought that they wouldn't come off I still couldn't slide either of the discs forwards or backwards. Again I loosened the flange bolts and tried to adjust the discs. Finally after all that I was able to get the discs to move one hole and then the leading corner of the "L" flanges would hit on the main frame, preventing the discs from being adjusted more than one hole.

Unbelieveable poor design and or craftsmanship for an $1100 disc.

Wonder now what problems I'm facing with the bush hog.

Chain Bender

FWIW, Carry a wrench with when disking. Checking the tightness of the axle nuts is imperative until all settles in. Ken Sweet

 

[LD1]

Boy, what an interesting read.

Here's my thoughts.

First of all, for those of us that are unfamiliar with that disk, some pictures would be helpful.

Second, No sense in badmouthing and bashing KK IMO.

KK is by far not the worst or lowest quality implement manufacture. But I'm certainly not saying their the best either. It's like everything on the market today, there is different quality levels. You certainly wouldn't buy a hyuandi and expect it to be of lexus quality would you??

And as with everything in manufacturing and mass-production, problems can arise. NOTHING is perfect and NO companies make 100% perfect products 100% of the time. Thats what customer service and warrenties are for.

What makes a good company is how they handle the occasional situation like yours where a problem occurs.

Your first mistake was trying to cut and weld and grind on a BRAND NEW $1100 disk without contacting KK.

Like I said, things happen. No company is perfect. KK likely would have resolved the problem with you, but now they may not since you have "attempted" to fix it. But it is still worth a call to them to see if they can help. If they do resolve your problems to your satisfaction, to me that speaks volumes of them as a company. But even if they dont, it would still be good for them to know that there might be a potential problem with their design/manufacturing.

Before you do anymore KK bashing, I'd suggest you give them a call. If something goes wrong with your L3200 in the next week, are you going to be on here telling everyone how bad kubota is?? I have a L3400. My tach cable broke @ .3 hrs I contacted them instead of bad-mouthing them and they promptly sent me a new cable. That is why my next tractor will more than likely be a kubota.:thumbsup:

 

[gwdixon]

I had the exact same issue with a $3K Howse disc. Your description of the design and problems make me think that Howse makes the KK.

Like you, I fixed the out of adjustment factors so it now works just fine. Such things should be an expectation since folks tend to purchase based on price rather than quality. Equipment manufacturers have to keep prices down, or at least reasonable, to stay in business.

My take on it is that you are dealing with a piece of farm equipment, not a Lexus.

Brand new, attachments generally have the paint chipped, rust spots here and there, things don't line up exactly, and then you are going to take it out and beat it around anyway.

First time the 3PH is hooked up the paint in that area is toast. No reason to get **** about it, just deal with it and move on.

Take a look at any 5+ year old farm equipment and there are welds, rust, bends, wear, faded paint, and so forth. They still command a high price as their usefulness is not diminished.

 

[Chain Bender]

I suppose I could change my schedule full of doctor's appointments for myself and wife and go ahead and load the tractor and disc back up on my trailer adn haul it the 50 miles to where I bought it from and drop it off and let them (the tractor dealership) let it sit in the back lot for a month or so while they make contact with KK. Mean while, I'm out a $1100 implement I need to be using.

If I contacted KK do you think they would send a service truck to my house to correct the shoddy craftmanship and save me two trips to the dealership? Doubt it seriously.

I'm not much with all the picture posting, but I'll try to take some pics this morning before I go to church to show the "poblems" I have encountered.

Bottom line is that with the configuration the disc is sold in it is impssible to adjust the gang set without completely removing a 5/8 inch bolt (adjustment pin) and loosening a pair of 5/8" bolts on each interior gang. Then and only then can you move the gangs. Then you can drop the center (adjusting) bolt back in, re-tighten the two bolts on the gangs, then tighten the center bolt. Repeat this for the other set of gangs if you wish to adjust them too.

Oh, wait a minute. There's this problem with a 3/8" thick piece of metal bumping up against the main frame preventing the gangs from moving more than one adjustment hole.

Maybe I'm the only one to experience the problem, but I doubt it.

CB

 

[Ford850]

Are you talking about a KK disk like this?

 

[sweettractors]

What ever happened to the King Kutter Rep that was on TBN regularly back earlier? If your disc problem was a anomaly, The box store would just give you another disc or your money back. Ken Sweet

 

[Ford850]

Or this one?

 

[Ford850]

What ever happened to the King Kutter Rep that was on TBN regularly back earlier? If your disc problem was a anomaly, The box store would just give you another disc or your money back. Ken Sweet

Sweet, it sounds like he bought it with his new tractor from a dealer.

 

[sweettractors]

Sweet, it sounds like he bought it with his new tractor from a dealer.

I did not catch that Ford, however, The dealer would probably do the same swap out or money back. In addition the dealer could send some one out with correct parts to make the repair. Ken Sweet

 

[Chain Bender]

Here's the disc I've been bad mouthing. As you can see, it's not a giant, but isn't a cheap angle iron lightweight either.