pulling a wheel off a tiller?

troybilt · Jun 22, 2011

5030 said:
I took the wheels off my old but newer to me Horse and replaced the ouybaord seals. I used BP blaster for a couple days and a propane torch along with a 5 pound drilling hammer.

Never sieze is my friend now.

Just got this old Troy Horse for pennies, so no hurry to get the wheels off. The tires are cracked, and probably original, but garage kept. So the old Horse had something going for it.

Got it a few weeks ago, and changed oil, tranny oil, filter, and spark plug. Seems to start better. The plug was fouled black, the dealer said the engine was probably hosed from no air filter changes.

i may try to overhaul this engine myself, instead of just tossing it for a cheap replacement.

Amazing to me how people can buy expensive equipment and not do the simplest of maintenance. :confused2:

RandyBell · May 20, 2013

I hope this helps, because I am probably going to have to do this on the tiller I just got. I read on another site s guy that worked for troybuilt said they welded a nut on the hub and used a bolt to push the wheel off! I pulled the pins out of mine and have been spraying penetrating oil on them for a week I fired it up and ran it up against the garage wall and the one wheel came off, the other was the one I originally wanted to pull to fix a flat! I cleaned up the axle and never seized it, but I am thinking of drilling the hub and putting in a grease fitting to help keep this from happening.

Cordfed · Jun 4, 2013

Saxman said:
I learned this trick along time ago with my old Troy "Horse". I soaked it as much as possible with penetrating oil then I applied heat with a torch to the wheel and took a pipe wrench to the wheel to get it to rotate on the axle shaft. If you can get it to wiggle it will come off. The moral to this story: pull the wheels every year and clean and regrease the axle shafts.

Steve

Wise man.

If you are making headway moving it off the axle spray some more lube on both side and beat it back the at it came to lube it up in the hub area of the wheel

RandyBell · Jun 4, 2013

Cordfed I don't think that there was enough hub to get a good grip on with a pipe wrench! We welded a 1/2" nut on the hub which promptly broke, not the weld the nut! Then we welded a hardened 5/8" nut on and heated the hub red, we got it to move some, until we ran out of threads! Soaked it down with Kriol, I couldn't find a hardened bolt with threads long enough so back to the puller. Used progressively longer 3/8" bolts to push against the axle, with a lot of creaking and popping it finally came off! A little sand paper and some copper never seize and it slides on and off like it is supposed to. I did fill both tires with water for now to see if the extra weight would help, and it does make it easier to hold a straight line on the uphill parts of the garden!

Custom Parts · Jun 9, 2013

Removing those wheels is normally the toughest part of doing any work on the wheel shafts. The wheels often wind up being a casualty.
Tim

sergeant69 · Dec 1, 2013

back in the 90s when I decided to rebuild my 79 horse I had a **** of a time getting the wheels off. and this was with a farm shop full of tools. called troy bilt and the guy said "do what we do when we rebuild em . torch/cut the shaft and replace it. saves ur sanity". so I did. put old tires back on and filled em w/ GOOP. good to go.

grantiago · Apr 20, 2020

I know this is an old thread. But I feel the need to share this information. Hope it helps someone.

Here is what I tried to remove a stuck wheel:

soaked it with penetrating oil.
ran it a year with no pin in the axle. no luck
hammered on it.
Pried on it.
heated it.
Pried, hammered and heated.

Here is what worked:

How to free a stuck wheel on a troy bilt horse.
Tools:

Welder (any flavor)
Impact driver
Pneumatic drill
Wire wheel
Large socket
compressor

Materials:

Large nut and bolt.
Penetrating oil
paint

Spray the axle and hub of the rim liberally with penetrating oil.
Hammer and pry foolishly at the wheel for about an hour until you are completely frustrated.
Have a beer and think about how to do it right.
Wait overnight for the penetrating oil to go to work. I repeated this for the course of a year (not every night

).
I had the bolt laying around. It measures 0.9 x 14" I don't know the pitch. By chance that is about the diameter of the horse axle.
With the bolt as a guide weld the nut on the hub of the rim. Put down some material and spread the bead. I welded it with the tiller laying on its side and filled the well of the rim with water to keep everything cool. I drained and replaced the water as it became hot.
Thread the bolt into the nut and snug it up against the axle.
Put on the impact driver and thumped away for about a minute until the wheel comes off.
It moved so slowly I didn't think it was going to work.
Take an air drill, or electric for that matter, and clean the axle and hub with a wire wheel.
Leave the nut in place and paint the rim.

Total time: