Howling brush hog gear box

SteveM · Oct 25, 2004

I just bought a super cheap Farm Pro 4' brush cutter, and noticed that when you turn the shaft by hand, there was a bit of 'ticking' in the movement....no surprise, when I spin it to PTO speed, I get a pretty good howl - more than my KK 5 '. I did fill the gearbox with oil, and greased all zerks. I am thinking the texture in the rotation is because the gears are not well machined.....any thoughts?

Second and most important, should I be concerned?

HayDR · Oct 25, 2004

Likely the gears are not shimmed properly or they could not be a matched set from the same vender. If the gears are not cut as mirror images then you will have excess noise and or excess heat. Return and or exchange the machine.

Soundguy · Oct 26, 2004

I'm guessing you may have simply got a bad unit. I've hand turned a few at shows just to 'feel' them, and if i had felt a catch.. that would be a sure sign of a gear imperfection.

If they were straight cut gears and not helical hears i would expect a good deal of gear noise as well. Perhaps it is a 'finish' issue with the gears.

Farm pro is usually decent about warranty.

If for some reason you do keep it.. try a much heavier oil.. like an outboard lower end lube, or even a cornhead grease.

Soundguy

JJT · Oct 26, 2004

Another trick I learned from an old farmer - shoot a tube of grease into the gearbox. My brush hog has had a slow leaked since it was a year old. Once a year I'll shoot a tube of grease into it and top it off with oil and mow like crazy. In a good year I'll brush hog 40 - 60 acres, (some fields multiple times), mid season it might need the oil topped off.

markct · Oct 26, 2004

yup thats what we do to all our brushog gear boxes, even the ones that dont leak, reason is that if the seal got torn out and you didnt know it there is atleast some grease to keep from destroying the gearbox before you notice the oil leaked out

Soundguy · Oct 28, 2004

We've used grease in old worn out gear and steering boxes.. but I hadn't seen too many new applications for grease in gear boxes, but did see a post hear about a year ago for a guy with an old tiller that had a gear box that spec'ed grease. Then I bought my HD 10 mower from howse and was suprised to see it spec'ed grease...

Soundguy