Weird John Deere L130 Transaxle Issue

[jenkinsph]

Good luck with it.

 

[RUSSELL SHETTLE]

The thing to keep in mind is that the transmission does fine if you use the mower for what it's designed for. Where people run into trouble is on hills and in other situations that exceed the transmission's duty rating. This is a basic box-store mower, engineered for it's price point. You can spend more and step up to a higher model Deere for mowing hills and other heavier-duty workloads.

I fully agree with your statement and yes people will push their mowers beyond their design limit not realizing it's limit. I cut about one acre total and my yard does have a slight 5% grade of a hill but I only cut grass with my D130. I don't intend to plow snow or do any hauling though they sell the attachments for that.

Still, I think the transmissions should have been supplied with a synthetic. Tuff Torq states that they ship their transmissions dry to the various companies and they will put in conventional oil to save money. You have no idea what they are putting in them. Plus, the transmissions will be made (not all) without drain plugs per company specifications.

When I drained the oil from the transmission after only 8 hours of use the oil had a dark film. There was no discernible metal collected on the magnet, just a blackish film. The oil was still yellow but not clear. It looked similar to the oil I drained out of the engine crankcase. The 8 hours is a break-in period, as I'm sure you know. I'm sure a similar break-in takes place as well with the transmission yet you (the owner) is not suppose to nor can you service it during the warranty period and would cost you to have JD do it it they were even willing by no failure. I wanted to do it. I wanted the protection of a recommended synthetic regardless of my careful use of the mower. I had no problem voiding the warranty to do this for myself. These low level tractors are very easy to work on. Even the transmissions of the K46 line that come with drain plugs (2 plugs in fact), it would be very difficult to add the oil back in with it being mounted. There are no drain plugs on mine of course so I had no choice but to take it out to change the oil.

I intend to change it again after the first 50 hours, then 200 hours after that as recommended by Tuff Torq, and that with the use of a synthetic. The rest of the maintenance requirements are very easy. I expect pulleys to eventually fail and they are easy to replace.

The steering assembly is weak but also appears to be easy to replace. I've looked it over quite thoroughly.

I'm not unhappy with the unit in any way, just a little disappointed in a product that is supposed to be JD tough but then again, I've realized how common the assembly overall is to other riding mowers in it's price range.

 

[jenkinsph]

The thing to keep in mind is that the transmission does fine if you use the mower for what it's designed for. Where people run into trouble is on hills and in other situations that exceed the transmission's duty rating. This is a basic box-store mower, engineered for it's price point. You can spend more and step up to a higher model Deere for mowing hills and other heavier-duty workloads.

The interesting thing I found out while researching the Deere mowers a few weeks ago is that while I hear about this quote, "if you use the mower for what it is designed for". If you go to Deere website and use their mower selector and enter 2 acres, some slopes or hills, mower widths from 42 to 62 inch cuts, some trees, mowing and bagging, then Deere recommends everything from the D140 and larger. Then select the carrying and hauling term and see where it leads you. If you select 4 acres Deere recommends the x300 and up.
It would help if Deere would adjust their literature to reflect what is reasonable to expect.

I recommend anyone who is interested in the k46 debates play with the Deere selector application to see what I mean. The key word is "challenging" when you select that it recommends the x500 and up.

 

[RUSSELL SHETTLE]

Jenkinsph,

I did just what you suggested and went to the JD site and played with their selector application. I chose exactly what my requirements were, 1 acre, slopes and hills, a few obstacles, grass cutting only. It came back with only one suggested model.... the exact one that I bought, the D130.

So, if I use it only as intended, keep it "CLEAN", do all the maintenance, change the oil in the engine AND the trans with synthetic every year.... this mower should last forever!

I'm going to make this into a personal science project. I will change the oil in the K46 (TLT200)* trans with 5W50 Synthetic every 50 hours or once a year, whichever comes first, and see how far I can take it. It's new, has 8 hours now and the oil was just changed to 5W50 Syn. I figure I should live long enough.

* Note: My manual shows the model TLT200 for the Trans. It appears to be identical to the K46. I have no idea what actual difference it is.

 

[jenkinsph]

Russel,
It will be interesting to see how this works out, good to have an unbiased experiment on this. If I have time this winter I plan on repairing my L130 and refilling with synthetic oil. When the mower works it has a nice cut imo.

 

[RUSSELL SHETTLE]

Russel,
It will be interesting to see how this works out, good to have an unbiased experiment on this. If I have time this winter I plan on repairing my L130 and refilling with synthetic oil. When the mower works it has a nice cut imo.

Jenkinsph,

The thing is:.... I was fortunate to have discovered early the potential failures. Searching around the net for other reasons I ran into several YouTubes of people rebuilding their Trans. It got me thinking and curious as to why?????? This is a component part of my mower that is supposed to be unserviceable??? Then I read I should expect having to replace it before the rest of the mower wears out. That got me inspired to do even more research. I went to the Tuff Torq web site, etc. I just learned a lot and realized that it is serviceable and you can service the trans yourself if you have the ability and the tools, which I do.

I would have NEVER given the trans one single thought, seriously. NOTHING in the manual about it. It was simply not an item I needed to maintain.... or so I thought!!!!

Thanks to the many YouTube clips of people who have successfully rebuilt their trans and the Tuff Torq instructions, I decided to consider replacing the oil with the recommended 5W50 synthetic. That should be simple compared to a rebuild. But I have to admit, I was hesitant to just jump right in not knowing what I might be up against because I know I would have to remove it from the chassis along with the thought that I would also be voiding my warranty. I must have spent 2 or 3 days laying underneath the tractor with the bed removed looking over everything mechanical, planning my approach. "**** with the warranty! I'm jumping in and doing it.

It turned out to be a "piece of cake"

Brand new, and only 8 hours of use, the first engine oil change "break-in period" was due. I changed the oil in the engine first. I really, really wanted a good synthetic oil in the trans as well for the beginning of its life. Having learned what I did up front, this was the golden opportunity time frame to make an up-front difference for the trans.... I hope!

How many people have done this?

How many K46 Transmissions have had synthetic oil in them from the start?

What caused Tuff Torq to recommend changing to a 5W50 Synthetic oil in the first place? That's a huge difference from a 10W30 Conventional grade.

I have so many questions still but it's done now and we'll see how well it continues to perform in the future. I do plan on changing the oil each year or at least every 50 hours. ****, it's only 2.3 quarts!

 

[beenthere]

Russell
Enjoy the ride.

 

[Topcat14]

Russel,
It will be interesting to see how this works out, good to have an unbiased experiment on this. If I have time this winter I plan on repairing my L130 and refilling with synthetic oil. When the mower works it has a nice cut imo.

I doubt a refill of tranny fluid will help your transaxle, you let it go too long, you ‘ll probably need to rebuild it, or if you don’t have time ship the k46 to Duane at Tuff Torq – you can even have Duane upgrade your k46 to k57 - K57 adds a charge pump to improve oil flow and some other parts enhancement. Oil can be drained and replaced without removing transaxle- now that your property is leveled a k57 upgrade would last years

 

[Topcat14]

I fully agree with your statement and yes people will push their mowers beyond their design limit not realizing it's limit. I cut about one acre total and my yard does have a slight 5% grade of a hill but I only cut grass with my D130. I don't intend to plow snow or do any hauling though they sell the attachments for that.

Still, I think the transmissions should have been supplied with a synthetic. Tuff Torq states that they ship their transmissions dry to the various companies and they will put in conventional oil to save money. You have no idea what they are putting in them. Plus, the transmissions will be made (not all) without drain plugs per company specifications.

When I drained the oil from the transmission after only 8 hours of use the oil had a dark film. There was no discernible metal collected on the magnet, just a blackish film. The oil was still yellow but not clear. It looked similar to the oil I drained out of the engine crankcase. The 8 hours is a break-in period, as I'm sure you know. I'm sure a similar break-in takes place as well with the transmission yet you (the owner) is not suppose to nor can you service it during the warranty period and would cost you to have JD do it it they were even willing by no failure. I wanted to do it. I wanted the protection of a recommended synthetic regardless of my careful use of the mower. I had no problem voiding the warranty to do this for myself. These low level tractors are very easy to work on. Even the transmissions of the K46 line that come with drain plugs (2 plugs in fact), it would be very difficult to add the oil back in with it being mounted. There are no drain plugs on mine of course so I had no choice but to take it out to change the oil.

I intend to change it again after the first 50 hours, then 200 hours after that as recommended by Tuff Torq, and that with the use of a synthetic. The rest of the maintenance requirements are very easy. I expect pulleys to eventually fail and they are easy to replace.

The steering assembly is weak but also appears to be easy to replace. I've looked it over quite thoroughly.

I'm not unhappy with the unit in any way, just a little disappointed in a product that is supposed to be JD tough but then again, I've realized how common the assembly overall is to other riding mowers in it's price range.

Russell
I have no idea why JD doesn’t put 5w50 in transaxle- heat is enemy of k46 and quite simply synthetic handles heat much better it’s only a couple liters so cost can’t be that much more.

With 1 acre basically flat land your D130 should last a long time( I have a La135se predecessor of d130) that I changed to synthetic and have had no problems. Good luck !!

 

[jenkinsph]

Russel,
If you change the oil every 50 hours that should keep everything clean for sure. Should also help longevity too. But it should not be necessary to change the tranny oil every year or 50 hour interval. If that is needed to get reasonable life expectancy then it should have accessibility to fill and drain ports.

Looking forward to your reports on this in the future but it may take several years for you to get enough hours on the mower to form an opinion. Keep us posted.