2018 L2501 HST often difficult to shift into LOW gear

[s219]

Every HST I've ever driven (economy Kubota, Grand Kubota, premium JD, economy JD, TYM, LS, probably others) has had a clunky shifting 2 or 3 speed transmission. They are cheap straight cut gears that are hard to shift at times, but they are strong & reliable. And the nature of HST means you dont need to shift a lot, so manufacturers keep using them

Bumping the go pedal or letting the machine roll a very little generally let's the gears line up so you can shift into whatever gear is balking.

Ditto this! I just blip the HST treadle and it always solves the problem (trick my first Kubota salesman taught me many years ago).

 

[diesel85]

I don't understand... ALL HST tractors I've used in my lifetime I've sometimes had to hit the pedal to get it to line up. Even my little BX does it. Rarely can I go from H to L without not hitting the treadle/pedal (whatever you want to call the darn thing).

 

[rScotty]

Every HST I've ever driven (economy Kubota, Grand Kubota, premium JD, economy JD, TYM, LS, probably others) has had a clunky shifting 2 or 3 speed transmission. They are cheap straight cut gears that are hard to shift at times, but they are strong & reliable. And the nature of HST means you dont need to shift a lot, so manufacturers keep using them

Bumping the go pedal or letting the machine roll a very little generally let's the gears line up so you can shift into whatever gear is balking.

That's right. Difficult range shifting is the nature of these beasts. It's not a matter of "things breaking in". The L/M/H range shift gearbox is like a separate gearbox located between the HST and the rear axle. Those range shift gears are all big, stong, and all non-syncro sliding gears...., so that when you shift ranges you really are doing what it feels like you are doing - You are physically using the hand shifter as a lever to slide a fairly large gear along a shaft to engage another gear.

It would help if the gear shafts could rotate the little bit necessary to allow the gears to engage. But the way it is built, the only way to get those particular shafts to rotate is for the HST to move them or the back wheels to rotate. Playing with the clutch won't help.

Of course there IS just a little slop and tolerance built into the range shifting system. And it's just enough slop so that sometimes you can line things up to engage by bumping the range shift lever with the palm of your hand. You may get pretty good at doing that in a few hundred hours. That's OK when it works, but it's probably gentler on the tractor to ever-so-slightly blip the HST or else let the rear tires roll just a tiny bit so that the shafts rotate enough to let the gears line up and engage. You'll get good at doing that, too.

Not exactly a sophisticated transmission, but hey.... it's just a tractor.
rScotty

 

[garagehound3]

After reading everyone's comments it unfortunately appears I have a normal Kubota transmission "quirk" that I can minimize buy cycling the HST pedal before putting it gear or simply coax it into gear w or w/o the clutch. Thanks to ALL for your input.

 

[Fallon]

After reading everyone's comments it unfortunately appears I have a normal Kubota transmission "quirk" that I can minimize buy cycling the HST pedal before putting it gear or simply coax it into gear w or w/o the clutch. Thanks to ALL for your input.

Dont wory about it before shifting. Try to shift & if it won't slide into gear with moderate pressure, let off the shift lever. Tap the go pedal just a hair. Then repeat the process. Every tap on the go pedal rotates a gear a bit & gives you another chance they line up well enough to shift properly. It might already be lined up the first time, so try it before bumping the go pedal.

It becomes 2nd nature pretty quickly. You can also let the machine roll ever so slightly (couple inches) for the same effect if you are on a slope. If you are rolling more than a a few inches per second or so, that causes gears to grind.