biker128pedal said:
Is it a shuttle type? If not what is shuttle type transmission and why is it easier to operate a FEL with one.
There are 3 basic types of transmissions you'll see on CUTs:
1: Standard gear tranny. This is like a standard trans in a car/truck. You've got several forward gears(usually 3ish) and 1 reverse. You also can (and usually do) have multiple speed ranges which multiply these. You'll often see this expressed as 9x3, which means 9 forward gears and 3 reverse, since I've never seen a CUT with multiple reverse gears, this also shows that there are 3 ranges. So you have a 3 gear tranny with 1 reverse gear and 3 ranges. To change directions, you shift from a forward speed to reverse and back again. Some tractors line up 1st or 2nd directly with reverse and have the ranges close to simulate a shuttle. These may or may not have synchros to allow shifting on the move.
2: Shuttle trans. This is basically a standard gear trans with the direction function pulled out. So you will still have your gears and ranges, but in addition you'll have a shuttle lever. So you select the gear you want, and then you just move the shuttle forward to go forward and backwards to go backwards. The shuttle doesn't affect the speed at all. It's basically a switch. There are a few different types of shuttles:
a: Standard shuttle: No synchros, you have to stop (or nearly stop) to change directions.
b: Synchro shuttle: Synchronized, you can change direction without stopping, but still need to work the clutch.
c: Power shuttle: Basically a syncro shuttle with an automatic clutch. You just move the shuttle lever back and forth and the tractor takes care of the clutching and whatever else needs to happen
3: Finally we have the hydrostatic. No clutches, no shuttle, just 2 pedals. Push the forward pedal to go forward, and the reverse pedal to go backwards. Push harder to go faster. You'll still have the speed range selector.
A standard gear trans is not the best for loader work, or any work with a lot of direction changes. It's certainly doable, and worked fine for years, but the shuttle and the hydro provide some more user friendly options these days. I personally wouldn't consider a standard shuttle as it's not really any better than a gear trans, and I'm not sure there are many available. The synchro shuttle is the minimum to gain any productivity, and a power shuttle can be quite nice.
Conversely, the gear and shuttle transmissions are a bit better than a hydro for things like plowing and mowing where you want to just set a speed and cruise. The hydro's usually have some sort of cruise control to make this less of an issue. Hydros also give up a little PTO hp to gear trannys.
The 1528 is available with either a 9x3 standard gear transmission, or 3 range hydrostatic.
I hope that clears things up, and I hope I'm not way off base on anything. I also hope I didn't misinterpret your question and just explained a bunch of stuff that you already know. Basically, I have a lot of hope.
Mike