richfranklin
New member
I was able to gently work it our after I had split the case. However, I'm pretty sure they included a new one in the rebuild kit.
TuffTorq K46 Repair Guide with Pictures
- Thread starter LotsofGreenGrass
- Start date
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I was able to gently work it our after I had split the case. However, I'm pretty sure they included a new one in the rebuild kit.
RBLapham
Silver Member
It is just press fit on, gently pry up on the edges with a thin tool. I used my pocket knife being careful not to cut it.
richfranklin
New member
I forgot to mention what RBLapham commented. I used a flat blade screw driver and it worked right out.
NDBBM
New member
Hey all. First post here. Let me start off by saying, this is great. Heck of a thread! I read all 77 pages.
My main question is this. Following LOGG's handy plan, I got the trans off the machine and scrubbed up. I was getting ready to order parts and got a shock. This was not the tranny I was expecting on this machine. I don't know why I assumed I had a K46. But I don't. I have a T40J. I don't think that much matters as the plan of attack should be the same. But I wanted to verify that with the more knowledgeable than me. Are the 2 trannys the same? Or should I be ordering specifically T40 parts from the infamous Derrick Dalton? Thanks in advance!
My main question is this. Following LOGG's handy plan, I got the trans off the machine and scrubbed up. I was getting ready to order parts and got a shock. This was not the tranny I was expecting on this machine. I don't know why I assumed I had a K46. But I don't. I have a T40J. I don't think that much matters as the plan of attack should be the same. But I wanted to verify that with the more knowledgeable than me. Are the 2 trannys the same? Or should I be ordering specifically T40 parts from the infamous Derrick Dalton? Thanks in advance!
RBLapham
Silver Member
Best thing to do is call Tuff Torq and ask them, they will get you the right parts. The two are most likely different. Talk to Derrick if possible, phone 1-866-572-3441 or email customerservice@tufftorq.com
I wanted to give everyone an update & summary my K46 experience with my L130 for those (like me) who don't often feel like searching past posts:
1. Jul 2012: 366 hours. Bought used from seller who was very honest about the bad K46. Mows for 15-20 minutes before it can't climb hills anymore.
2. Oct 2012: 374 hours. Changed oil to Castrol Edge synthetic 5W50. Replaced broken cooling fan, replaced filter, and installed drain plugs, but didn't touch the pump & motor. New oil didn't help at all.
3. Apr 2013: 380 hours. Sanded down pump & motor, re-used the Castrol 5W50 synthetic oil. It ran great all summer mowing my very hilly ~1 acre yard for up to 1 hour at a time.
4. Dec 2013: 391 hours. It ran fine for 2.5 hours in snowblower mode for the first snowstorm of the season.
4. Feb 2014: 400 hours. However, it turned out to be a very harsh winter. The extra load of the snowblower, weights, and hilly driveway finally took their toll. Eventually the K46 ran only 15-20 minutes before having trouble climbing even small inclines.
5. May 2014: 410 hours. Opened up the K46 to find lots of large metal flakes in the filter and very tiny metal flakes in the oil. Rebuilt the K46 with T40 differential, pump & motor from Ebay, and replaced oil with new Castrol 5W50 synthetic. Back to mower mode, and it worked well for only 3 weeks before starting to slow down on steeper hills.
6. Aug 2014: 417 hours. It can only mow for 15-20 minutes before stalling on hills, same problem as when I first got it. Opened up the K46 to find plenty of metal flakes on the filter and everywhere (top photo) - the source is obviously the disintegrating gears on the motor output shaft (bottom photo), since the new diff gears still look pristine.
The pump, motor & case are all scored like before, so there's no need to post pictures of those. I'm just disappointed that a new set lasted less than 10 hours, being done in by weak gears that are literally breaking themselves down and taking everything else to **** with them. Something tells me I'm working the K46 too hard for what it's designed for.
Now I'm in the difficult decision on whether to spend another $376.64 + shipping on another pump & motor rebuild kit (Tuff Torq doesn't even allow you to buy the parts separately online anymore), replace the whole K46 with a new unit for $500+ (Ebay), or start shopping (and financing) a new garden tractor with a real trans.
1. Jul 2012: 366 hours. Bought used from seller who was very honest about the bad K46. Mows for 15-20 minutes before it can't climb hills anymore.
2. Oct 2012: 374 hours. Changed oil to Castrol Edge synthetic 5W50. Replaced broken cooling fan, replaced filter, and installed drain plugs, but didn't touch the pump & motor. New oil didn't help at all.
3. Apr 2013: 380 hours. Sanded down pump & motor, re-used the Castrol 5W50 synthetic oil. It ran great all summer mowing my very hilly ~1 acre yard for up to 1 hour at a time.
4. Dec 2013: 391 hours. It ran fine for 2.5 hours in snowblower mode for the first snowstorm of the season.
4. Feb 2014: 400 hours. However, it turned out to be a very harsh winter. The extra load of the snowblower, weights, and hilly driveway finally took their toll. Eventually the K46 ran only 15-20 minutes before having trouble climbing even small inclines.
5. May 2014: 410 hours. Opened up the K46 to find lots of large metal flakes in the filter and very tiny metal flakes in the oil. Rebuilt the K46 with T40 differential, pump & motor from Ebay, and replaced oil with new Castrol 5W50 synthetic. Back to mower mode, and it worked well for only 3 weeks before starting to slow down on steeper hills.
6. Aug 2014: 417 hours. It can only mow for 15-20 minutes before stalling on hills, same problem as when I first got it. Opened up the K46 to find plenty of metal flakes on the filter and everywhere (top photo) - the source is obviously the disintegrating gears on the motor output shaft (bottom photo), since the new diff gears still look pristine.
The pump, motor & case are all scored like before, so there's no need to post pictures of those. I'm just disappointed that a new set lasted less than 10 hours, being done in by weak gears that are literally breaking themselves down and taking everything else to **** with them. Something tells me I'm working the K46 too hard for what it's designed for.
Now I'm in the difficult decision on whether to spend another $376.64 + shipping on another pump & motor rebuild kit (Tuff Torq doesn't even allow you to buy the parts separately online anymore), replace the whole K46 with a new unit for $500+ (Ebay), or start shopping (and financing) a new garden tractor with a real trans.
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NDBBM
New member
Where do you get that notion? I've got separate T40 parts in my shopping cart as we speak. And I just checked on K46 parts and they can be added too. Am I doing something wrong?
Daronspicher
Member
Hi Folks, Daron Spicher from Daronspicher.com here. I posted some rebuild on my site a couple years ago and have had a lot of guests from here over to take a look. Welcome and thanks.
That was at 360 hrs and before anyone was really doing their own sanding/machining of the parts. On that one I plugged in about $400 on the rebuild with parts and shipping.
My update: I'm 83 hrs down the road(434 hrs now) and finally pulled it apart to do again. Here is a little bit about what I found and learned this round.
First off, 83 hrs is really too soon to be rebuilding the transmission. I've seen others on the thread with much less hours per rebuild, so I guess I'll try to feel lucky.
The 5w50 Synthetic looked really bad coming out. Think in the direction of muddy. I thought it would still be clean, or near it.
The "updated" filter I got with the last rebuild was nearly plugged up with filings and grease like gunk.
The aluminum housing part was scored up like they all are. The magnets had plenty of metal filings on them.
The pump and motor blocks also scored up as usual. I saw minimal signs of gears degrading.
I used the 400 grit wet(with oil) sanding method on the aluminum block surfaces, they shined up quickly and fairly easily, straight forward.
The motor and pump blocks were a different story. I believe I learned something here, which may have been said on here before, but there are a lot of pages of people talking here and I didn't catch them all.
When I started sanding down the pump and motor blocks, the outer of the 3 scoring rings quickly sanded smooth. And I kept sanding and kept sanding and sanded and sanded and eventually gave up. I never did get to smoothing out the 2 inner scoring circles. For some reason the 2 inner circles were worn down a lot more than the outer one and I eventually came up wondering if that surface is even supposed to be flat across??
So, cleaned up. My sanding experiment gone about as well as it could, filter cleaned, magnets cleaned, I put it all back together. I would bet I'm a bit past 2.5 quarts of new 5w50 synthetic in it, I believe I was seeing 2.2 as the right amount. I filled it up, tried to burp it and then filled it more.
Put it all back together and gave it a go.
It was super tight. I am heading into the future with the weakness of the tranny design on top of my mind, but I also mowed a couple solid hours without feeling the first sign of soft. That is like getting a pardon from a life sentence for someone who's been driving on a soft tuff torq for 30 hrs.
In my mind, the key to the operation is the fact those pump and motor blocks were worn more in the middle than on the outer edge. Sand them puppies down a lot or the job isn't going to go tight for you. At least that's my new personal theory on it. That idea may be old and all over this thread, so I just want to couch my "findings" as quite possibly being found already a long time ago by a whole bunch of people. If they weren't... I hope it helps out now and from here forward.
I'm back in business for now, have my eye on a new X530, just don't know if I'll pull that trigger or not. Does the K72 grenade itself like this after a few hours?
Thanks for reading, -Daron
That was at 360 hrs and before anyone was really doing their own sanding/machining of the parts. On that one I plugged in about $400 on the rebuild with parts and shipping.
My update: I'm 83 hrs down the road(434 hrs now) and finally pulled it apart to do again. Here is a little bit about what I found and learned this round.
First off, 83 hrs is really too soon to be rebuilding the transmission. I've seen others on the thread with much less hours per rebuild, so I guess I'll try to feel lucky.
The 5w50 Synthetic looked really bad coming out. Think in the direction of muddy. I thought it would still be clean, or near it.
The "updated" filter I got with the last rebuild was nearly plugged up with filings and grease like gunk.
The aluminum housing part was scored up like they all are. The magnets had plenty of metal filings on them.
The pump and motor blocks also scored up as usual. I saw minimal signs of gears degrading.
I used the 400 grit wet(with oil) sanding method on the aluminum block surfaces, they shined up quickly and fairly easily, straight forward.
The motor and pump blocks were a different story. I believe I learned something here, which may have been said on here before, but there are a lot of pages of people talking here and I didn't catch them all.
When I started sanding down the pump and motor blocks, the outer of the 3 scoring rings quickly sanded smooth. And I kept sanding and kept sanding and sanded and sanded and eventually gave up. I never did get to smoothing out the 2 inner scoring circles. For some reason the 2 inner circles were worn down a lot more than the outer one and I eventually came up wondering if that surface is even supposed to be flat across??
So, cleaned up. My sanding experiment gone about as well as it could, filter cleaned, magnets cleaned, I put it all back together. I would bet I'm a bit past 2.5 quarts of new 5w50 synthetic in it, I believe I was seeing 2.2 as the right amount. I filled it up, tried to burp it and then filled it more.
Put it all back together and gave it a go.
It was super tight. I am heading into the future with the weakness of the tranny design on top of my mind, but I also mowed a couple solid hours without feeling the first sign of soft. That is like getting a pardon from a life sentence for someone who's been driving on a soft tuff torq for 30 hrs.
In my mind, the key to the operation is the fact those pump and motor blocks were worn more in the middle than on the outer edge. Sand them puppies down a lot or the job isn't going to go tight for you. At least that's my new personal theory on it. That idea may be old and all over this thread, so I just want to couch my "findings" as quite possibly being found already a long time ago by a whole bunch of people. If they weren't... I hope it helps out now and from here forward.
I'm back in business for now, have my eye on a new X530, just don't know if I'll pull that trigger or not. Does the K72 grenade itself like this after a few hours?
Thanks for reading, -Daron
This is what I get from my K46AC shopping screen:
They removed the Add button next to select items including the pump, motor, & case.
NDBBM
New member
I see what's going on. Instead of clicking parts, click the blue serial number that matches your's. Then you get a screen like attachment number 2 where you can cherry pick pieces!:thumbsup:
