PTO engagement using a rotary mower

[tmajor]

I'm not totally familiar with the magnetic clutches, even though, my zero turn has one. A rheostat, might do the trick, by applying, less than full voltage to the clutch at start-up, and increasing to full voltage, to attain the full operating speed. There might even be one incorporated in the existing system, since the "PTO Engagement" switch "turns". Other wise, it could be just a toggle or pull switch. I haven't gotten that far, yet.

Has anyone tried turning the switch partway, to see if the PTO starts spinning? I'd try it, but I drained all of the fluids.

 

[JWR]

All this fiddling with the engagement switch and talk of modifications seems inadvisable to me. Sounds like hunting for trouble. Far more likely to cause problems than to fix something that simply is not broken. There are many hundreds of thousands of these things out there and no significant examples of an engagement problem. Starting the mower turning with the engine at idle is minimum stress on everything if you want to be easy on the equipment. Then bring it up to rated rpm. Why bother with anything else ?

 

[bearthebruce]

I know this is a 3 year old thread.... We have a 1533 and no soft start. Our idle RPM is 700. At idle, the machine will start our brush hog turning and it is much more calm that starting at 1200 or higher. We then run the engine up to 2500 RPM to mow. She runs like a champ for hours - I've run her for 12 hours with stops only to grab a bite to eat or fuel.. I think the slamming as the hog starts is normal. I watched a big John Deere start his 8' hog... his whole tractor shook and he does that for a living, running the machine everyday for paying customers.