So, I now have seven skinned knuckles from working on new equipment! Boy, my dealer is going to hear from me tomorrow.
I picked up three implements this weekend to go with the TC30. After backing the rotary cutter into the garage, I sat it down and walked around it to clear something out of the way. On doing so, I noticed a grease fitting on the floor. Picking it up, I saw that it went to the rear tire assemble. Great! I thought. It hasn't even been used once and things are already falling off of it. So, I sat it aside and went after the tiller.
At first, I attached the lift arms with intentions of moving it inside also. But when I went to connect the top link, I couldn't. There, with the linch pins bolt running through it, was a spacer. I pulled the pin and bolt, but the spacer would not budge. After examining the problem for a moment, I saw a bolt about five inches back, behind the top link. The left and right sides of this top hitch assemply were divided, so it would require a spacer near the top to maintain a rigid spacing. Obviously, the spacer was ment to be positioned around that top bolt, which held the two side secure. However, someone had decided to put the spacer on the hitch holes and tighten heck out of all the bolts. This wedged it in place. So I had to loosen all bolts on the top assembly and relocate the spacer to get it the heck out of the way so that the hitch could be used.
All of that went on yesterday. Today I revisited the grease nipple. Apparently, some musclehead had cranked down on it when installing and damaged the threads. It was screwed in too far and when it contacted the shaft, it lost. So for this I wrapped the threads with a good portion of thread tape and reinserted. Then I removed and applied a couple of drops of lock tight to the cut thread and reinserted. This went in nice and snug. Tomorrow, I will see if it can handle a grease gun. If not, I'll take off the rear tire assemble and return to the dealer for a replacement. He will hear about this anyway.
Finally, I decided to grease up the Covington planter, the third and final implement I purchased. If you have never seen one of these, you will have a hard time understanding what I'm talking about, but there are two disc in the front of the planter that are toed in towards each other. Their purpose is to open the soil so that seed may fall in the opening before the rear wheel closes the soil back up. Now these discs are supposed to turn. Well, I started at the back of the machine greasing and oiling it. When I got to the discs, I discovered that they would not budge. They were totally locked down. After two hours, I THINK that I might have this one figured out. A few nuts needed to be backed off a few rounds and a particular spacer needs to be extended with the use of washers by about 2 or 3.
SOoooo..... I will certainly be going over everything else on these machines with a fine tooth comb this week, checking all nuts and bolts, grease and oil traps, etc. etc.
Whatever happened to quality control. I wouldn't exactly say that I got this equipment at a bargain. Someone made some good money for throwing this stuff together. Or maybe a "Some Assembly Required" notice should be added to the paper work and owners manuals. /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif
Fortunately, I do enjoy tinkering with stuff like this. However, I just had it built up in my mind that everything would be perfect seeing as how it is new. Having to work on all three pieces was a little surprising. These were not major problems, but still.
I picked up three implements this weekend to go with the TC30. After backing the rotary cutter into the garage, I sat it down and walked around it to clear something out of the way. On doing so, I noticed a grease fitting on the floor. Picking it up, I saw that it went to the rear tire assemble. Great! I thought. It hasn't even been used once and things are already falling off of it. So, I sat it aside and went after the tiller.
At first, I attached the lift arms with intentions of moving it inside also. But when I went to connect the top link, I couldn't. There, with the linch pins bolt running through it, was a spacer. I pulled the pin and bolt, but the spacer would not budge. After examining the problem for a moment, I saw a bolt about five inches back, behind the top link. The left and right sides of this top hitch assemply were divided, so it would require a spacer near the top to maintain a rigid spacing. Obviously, the spacer was ment to be positioned around that top bolt, which held the two side secure. However, someone had decided to put the spacer on the hitch holes and tighten heck out of all the bolts. This wedged it in place. So I had to loosen all bolts on the top assembly and relocate the spacer to get it the heck out of the way so that the hitch could be used.
All of that went on yesterday. Today I revisited the grease nipple. Apparently, some musclehead had cranked down on it when installing and damaged the threads. It was screwed in too far and when it contacted the shaft, it lost. So for this I wrapped the threads with a good portion of thread tape and reinserted. Then I removed and applied a couple of drops of lock tight to the cut thread and reinserted. This went in nice and snug. Tomorrow, I will see if it can handle a grease gun. If not, I'll take off the rear tire assemble and return to the dealer for a replacement. He will hear about this anyway.
Finally, I decided to grease up the Covington planter, the third and final implement I purchased. If you have never seen one of these, you will have a hard time understanding what I'm talking about, but there are two disc in the front of the planter that are toed in towards each other. Their purpose is to open the soil so that seed may fall in the opening before the rear wheel closes the soil back up. Now these discs are supposed to turn. Well, I started at the back of the machine greasing and oiling it. When I got to the discs, I discovered that they would not budge. They were totally locked down. After two hours, I THINK that I might have this one figured out. A few nuts needed to be backed off a few rounds and a particular spacer needs to be extended with the use of washers by about 2 or 3.
SOoooo..... I will certainly be going over everything else on these machines with a fine tooth comb this week, checking all nuts and bolts, grease and oil traps, etc. etc.
Whatever happened to quality control. I wouldn't exactly say that I got this equipment at a bargain. Someone made some good money for throwing this stuff together. Or maybe a "Some Assembly Required" notice should be added to the paper work and owners manuals. /forums/images/graemlins/mad.gif
Fortunately, I do enjoy tinkering with stuff like this. However, I just had it built up in my mind that everything would be perfect seeing as how it is new. Having to work on all three pieces was a little surprising. These were not major problems, but still.
