Alan L.
Elite Member
I posted last night my experience with unloading the tiller. Today I got to try it out.
First, let me comment on the appearance of the tiller. Very heavy and seems very well made. Paint job is horrible. Looks like some beige paint was sprayed on it with no primer or anything. Nearly transparent in places, dripping in other places. Weld spatters and imperfections just painted over. Everything was painted - the gearbox spline (I had to scrape it off to put the shaft on there), bolt threads, even the grease zirk on the end of the tiller shaft was painted over. The bad paint was further damaged by all the chains the Tractor Supply store drug across it every day to keep people from stealing them (good luck stealing this 690 pound baby).
When you buy something at Tractor Supply you'd better know something about it, because they sure don't. I made the decision to get the KK 60" and called ahead, they said they had one in stock. It was stting on the pavement on the parking lot. After they loaded it into the back of my truck, the guy says he needs to sign my receipt and says he's had a long day and he going to the house.
"I will need a PTO shaft, some gear oil and an owners manual" I said. Oh, I'll be back. He leaves and goes to the back part of the store out back and finally comes back with a 2.5 gallon jug of grease (they had already told me inside that came with the tiller) and a PTO shaft. Well I could tell right quick this was not the shaft for my tiller. No slip clutch. And the dead giveaway was the words "spreader" writtin on the shaft.
"No, this is the wrong shaft I said. The shaft with this tiller has a slip clutch" Honestly , the guy said that he had never seen a slip clutch. He then said thats the best he could do, that didn't know anything about a slip clutch. I then mentioned the prospect that he get the fork lift back over here and remove the tiller and I would go to another Tractor Supply and get a COMPLETE tiller. At this point he invited ME to go in the back with him and identify what I needed. So we went back there and I found they had 2 new 60" tillers in crates, with PTO shafts included (with slip clutch). Inside the back of the store were shelves of various PTO shafts.'
About that time, a lady came back, one who seemed to know more about it. She found the two ends of a shaft in two different places. I was not comfortable with this, so I mentione robbing the intact shaft from one of the tillers in the crates, since obviously the one from mine had be robbed. So I got my shaft.
Lastly, I asked about the manual and we finally discovered it attached to the front side of the back gate of the tiller.
Wow, this is getting long. I found the manual to be almost useless. One of the instructions was to fill the gearbox "half way". How can you tell when its "half" full? Fortunately the fill hole is on the top, so I stuck a carpenters pencil down the hole as far as it would go, and held my finger at the point where it stuck out of the hole. Then I marked about halfway from there to the bottom of the pencil and filled it to there, using it as a dipstick.
There is a grease zirk on the end of the tine shaft away from the gear drive. The instructions were to "grease it". How much? I pumped it full until there was a hissing noise, took the gun off and not only did grease come pumping back out the zirk, but out of the gasket itself. I guess I ruined that although no more came out once the pressure was decreased.
I cut an inch of each end of the PTO shaft just to be able to get it on there, probably needs more cut off. But since I was using a hacksaw it was ALOT of work. I want do anymore cutting til I get a cutting wheel for my angle grinder.
Finally got to try it out. The first thing I noticed is MAN, do those tines turn at a high RPM! I can tell this tiller is lot for my tractor to handle. I hope I made the right choice. In places it bogged my RPMs from 2600 down to 2000 so I had to slow way down. I was using the depth as set and it looks like mayby halfway, so not real deep, maybe 4". I raised it up just a little with the lift (didn't set the tiller) and found I could move fast then.
It works great, I'm just a little concerned that my tractor will be overworked, or that I will have to go much slower to the point I could have gotten more tilled faster with a smaller tiller. But I only have 10 minutes of tilling, so thats not a very good test.....
Hopefully this will help others considering this tiller. I think the quality is mechanics, and corners are cut on the fit and finish to keep the price low. I paid $1154.98 which I think is a good deal. Of couse I could have had the same tiller for $999 a year ago.
First, let me comment on the appearance of the tiller. Very heavy and seems very well made. Paint job is horrible. Looks like some beige paint was sprayed on it with no primer or anything. Nearly transparent in places, dripping in other places. Weld spatters and imperfections just painted over. Everything was painted - the gearbox spline (I had to scrape it off to put the shaft on there), bolt threads, even the grease zirk on the end of the tiller shaft was painted over. The bad paint was further damaged by all the chains the Tractor Supply store drug across it every day to keep people from stealing them (good luck stealing this 690 pound baby).
When you buy something at Tractor Supply you'd better know something about it, because they sure don't. I made the decision to get the KK 60" and called ahead, they said they had one in stock. It was stting on the pavement on the parking lot. After they loaded it into the back of my truck, the guy says he needs to sign my receipt and says he's had a long day and he going to the house.
"I will need a PTO shaft, some gear oil and an owners manual" I said. Oh, I'll be back. He leaves and goes to the back part of the store out back and finally comes back with a 2.5 gallon jug of grease (they had already told me inside that came with the tiller) and a PTO shaft. Well I could tell right quick this was not the shaft for my tiller. No slip clutch. And the dead giveaway was the words "spreader" writtin on the shaft.
"No, this is the wrong shaft I said. The shaft with this tiller has a slip clutch" Honestly , the guy said that he had never seen a slip clutch. He then said thats the best he could do, that didn't know anything about a slip clutch. I then mentioned the prospect that he get the fork lift back over here and remove the tiller and I would go to another Tractor Supply and get a COMPLETE tiller. At this point he invited ME to go in the back with him and identify what I needed. So we went back there and I found they had 2 new 60" tillers in crates, with PTO shafts included (with slip clutch). Inside the back of the store were shelves of various PTO shafts.'
About that time, a lady came back, one who seemed to know more about it. She found the two ends of a shaft in two different places. I was not comfortable with this, so I mentione robbing the intact shaft from one of the tillers in the crates, since obviously the one from mine had be robbed. So I got my shaft.
Lastly, I asked about the manual and we finally discovered it attached to the front side of the back gate of the tiller.
Wow, this is getting long. I found the manual to be almost useless. One of the instructions was to fill the gearbox "half way". How can you tell when its "half" full? Fortunately the fill hole is on the top, so I stuck a carpenters pencil down the hole as far as it would go, and held my finger at the point where it stuck out of the hole. Then I marked about halfway from there to the bottom of the pencil and filled it to there, using it as a dipstick.
There is a grease zirk on the end of the tine shaft away from the gear drive. The instructions were to "grease it". How much? I pumped it full until there was a hissing noise, took the gun off and not only did grease come pumping back out the zirk, but out of the gasket itself. I guess I ruined that although no more came out once the pressure was decreased.
I cut an inch of each end of the PTO shaft just to be able to get it on there, probably needs more cut off. But since I was using a hacksaw it was ALOT of work. I want do anymore cutting til I get a cutting wheel for my angle grinder.
Finally got to try it out. The first thing I noticed is MAN, do those tines turn at a high RPM! I can tell this tiller is lot for my tractor to handle. I hope I made the right choice. In places it bogged my RPMs from 2600 down to 2000 so I had to slow way down. I was using the depth as set and it looks like mayby halfway, so not real deep, maybe 4". I raised it up just a little with the lift (didn't set the tiller) and found I could move fast then.
It works great, I'm just a little concerned that my tractor will be overworked, or that I will have to go much slower to the point I could have gotten more tilled faster with a smaller tiller. But I only have 10 minutes of tilling, so thats not a very good test.....
Hopefully this will help others considering this tiller. I think the quality is mechanics, and corners are cut on the fit and finish to keep the price low. I paid $1154.98 which I think is a good deal. Of couse I could have had the same tiller for $999 a year ago.
