JD 3000 series front hitch for snowblower

[cdavid1944]

That's a much better design IMHO. By the way gbowling, my bearings slip over the shaft without a problem. But, I haven't mounted them on the hitch yet. Maybe there is a bit of a bind in the hitch. It may need a bit of shim under the retainer.

 

[gbowling]

The reason mine wouldn't go into the bearings at first was because they weren't lined up perfectly. The bearing mounts (3 bolts) have a bit of slop in them. When I loosened up the bolts, they had a bit of play in them and lined up easily and the shaft went right through. Then I tightened the bolts with a good alignment.

I now have the snowblower on and everything works well. The blower makes very little noise when engaged so I think it's all good.

Looking forward to blowing a bit of snow with it. I previously had a JD 345 lawn tractor with a berco 44" snowblower. It worked great, but my driveway is about 1/4 mile with a steep hill I had a hard time getting up the hill when the snow was deep with the 345 with chains.

This is a while different class of machine. With this much bigger tractor, 4 wheel drive, a heated cab, and a bigger blower I think snowblowing will actually be fun now.

 

[classic]

I have a newly purchased 3720 with a front snowblower. This is the first time trying to install it. I have the front brackets installed and am trying to get the drive shaft that goes from the mid-pto to the front hitch installed.

The front hitch has two bearings separated by a few inches that the spline end of the drive shaft goes through. I cannot seem to get the shaft through the bearings. Any tips on how to get this done?

By the way, installation of this shaft isn't listed in any of the manuals I have. The front hitch manual just has the front hitch hardware. The snowblower manual just has the snowblower and front shaft. There must be a manual to the front pto kit that I'm missing and can't seem to find online.

Thanks, Gary

You'll find it a lot easier if you loosen the bolts through the bearing flanges. It will allow the bearings to center on the shaft.f