my mower projects(name changed)

progress sounds good, I'm looking forward to more pictures.

what are you doing with the extra space on the frame? pulling off being able to seat 2 wold be cool.

RockeyDA wrote:

what are you doing with the extra space on the frame? pulling off being able to seat 2 wold be cool.

like this?


the frame and body are 99% complete, only the hood mounts are left, made a shifter rod out of a brake rod off a craftsman, has full gears forward and reverse, the wiring, engine, and drive system are still to be done and the mounting of the bed, but the bed can wait for awhile

well, youd denfently want some fenders with a setup like that, so the passanger aint getting there legs ripped between 2 sets of wheels. but yeah, i think that wold be pretty cool. if you made it a car seat make you can make it quick to take on and off, so its cargo one mint and person the next.

well the bad news is I can't quite get the bed put exactly where I want it, unless I remove the seat and don't have anywhere to sit, the good news is the hitch mount plate will make a perfect place to mount a pivot for a dump feature

found something cool while I was putting the steering sector gear in, the flange, bushing, what ever it's called, the doohickey that the gear rides on and allows it to turn even while the bolt is tightened down, is cammed, it has the hole for the bolt off center and depending on how you turn it before tightening the bolt down fully will either bring the sector gear closer to the steering shaft gear or further away, so if it gets to much play between the two gears I can turn that bushing thingamajig to tighten them back up, this is the first time I've actually seen this feature on a lawn tractors steering before.

darkside0914 wrote:

well the bad news is I can't quite get the bed put exactly where I want it, unless I remove the seat and don't have anywhere to sit, the good news is the hitch mount plate will make a perfect place to mount a pivot for a dump feature

cool start on the project, I had all the same problems with the seat and the bed, you probably saw what I did in the build off thread if not check it out.  I would just scoot the bed back a little further, and I think you need some support framework for the bed, not exactly sure your plans.

mrshaft696 wrote:

darkside0914 wrote:

well the bad news is I can't quite get the bed put exactly where I want it, unless I remove the seat and don't have anywhere to sit, the good news is the hitch mount plate will make a perfect place to mount a pivot for a dump feature

cool start on the project, I had all the same problems with the seat and the bed, you probably saw what I did in the build off thread if not check it out.  I would just scoot the bed back a little further, and I think you need some support framework for the bed, not exactly sure your plans.

I was actually planning on putting a sheet of 1/2in, plywood we have down over the bed floor, or maybe it was 9/16 can't remember, it came from the floor of a friends house when he renovated, and bolting it down with carriage bolts and bed frame underneath, that should be more than strong enough for anything I can haul with it, i was thinking of moving the seat forward an inch or two to give me the extra room i want, i don't really want to move the bed back any further unless i have no choice, I actually did see yours, I was as little surprised someone else was doing a similar build at the same time, yours looks a lot nicer than mine does

You have some other options to deal with this problem.


1) cut and shorten the dump bed (lots of fab time)

2) make a custom 2 piece seat, the bottom is bolted right in front of the bed and the back of the seat is actually bolted to the front of the bed,  how about that for a space saving design.  This way you can keep the bed where it is in the pictures but still have room to sit.

3) make a custom bed to you specifications (can be done for cheap with bed frames and plywood)

I was thinking about trying the custom seat idea, @Crazy_Carl i can cut the seat down and wrap a 2x6 with foam and vinyl for a seat back mounted to the bed, for the front support on the bed itself i plan to get rid of the original support from the trailer and mount a 4x6 or 6x6 block transversely and secure that to the frame with 6-4in lag bolts, i'll have to notch it for the shifter rod, i haven't been able to work on it the last few days, due to having to replace 80% of my sewer line where the old clay pipe collapsed , but that's done so i hope to get the engine on it and take it for a test drive this weekend, i also need to make the front axle solidly mounted, i have no give up and down, but the murray gt section of the frame flexes when i step on the foot boards, i think a combo of putting in some bracing and taking the movement out of the front axle should get rid of most of that flex

engine is mounted, belts are run, clutch is almost working, just need to cut a plate and extend the pedal out to where it belongs, still need to put on the carb, attach the throttle cable and fuel line and I can try a 1st test drive soon, i'll try to get actual video of that when it happens

hows the seat part coming along? or are you more concentrated on making it drive right now?

@RockeyDA just wanting to get it running and driving for right now, I still need to test my clutch setup and see if it works like I think it will, it's basically the same setup as it had as a veri-drive just without the pedal and pulley setup that ran the veri-drive, the factory clutch was on the rear belt and I left it as is with the front belt pulled tight

and it's alive, finished getting the engine installed and running today, set it up on jack stands and it drives with the tires in the air, still can't test the clutch though, I need to get some cutoff wheels to cut the plate I need, but I am going to take it on it's 1st test drive tomorrow, I did run into a problem though, I was putting the muffler on and the bolt snapped off in the hole, which I found odd since I had barely tightened it up when it happened

What a pain in the rear.  That must have been a used bolt you were trying right?

@Crazy_Carl yeah one of the ones that came off it originally, it didn't have any cracks in it that I saw, but it may have been a hairline crack that I missed,

I ran into a couple of minor issues on the test run, one was the video corrupted when I tried to transfer it from my brothers phone to my computer so I lost the entire video, another is shifting, i'll have to come up with some kind of reverse lockout or mount the murray gt fenders so I can use the shifter lockouts originally on this shifter setup, i'm not sure exactly what to do here but i'll figure something out, mostly it's just little minor stuff we run into when ever building a custom project like this and have to adapt parts to work where they weren't meant to work, but for the most part i'm happy with how it runs and after I get the clutch pedal fixed i'll give it another test run before getting ready to mount the bed

Doesn’t sound like too big of a problem. The fender swap sounds like an easy fix.

nothing to bad, I had planned to use them as front fenders, but it'll be fine without them, fortunately they just bolt up to the old murray body and should bolt right up to the noma body the same way,
EDIT, the part I need is not part of the fenders, it is a separate part altogether, however it won't just bolt up to the noma body liked I hoped, i'm going to have to make a bracket that it will bolt up to in order to use it,

you know, dinky might need front fenders, but how i stop is jamming my boot on my front v-treads. i drive it threw some snow to day and when i pick up speed the front tiers fling it right in my face.

RockeyDA wrote:

you know, dinky might need front fenders, but how i stop is jamming my boot on my front v-treads. i drive it threw some snow to day and when i pick up speed the front tiers fling it right in my face.

I watched the video, looked like you were having fun, on my murray lt I drop it into 1st at low idle then with the clutch pushed I stick it in reverse to stop, until I get the brake fixed anyway, been doing that for a couple years now and gotten used to it so i'm in no hurry to fix the brake.

I got the gear selector fixed the notched selector bracket was not part of the gt fender like I thought so I can still use the gt fenders for the front of rusty,

darkside0914 wrote:

RockeyDA wrote:

you know, dinky might need front fenders, but how i stop is jamming my boot on my front v-treads. i drive it threw some snow to day and when i pick up speed the front tiers fling it right in my face.

I watched the video, looked like you were having fun, on my murray lt I drop it into 1st at low idle then with the clutch pushed I stick it in reverse to stop, until I get the brake fixed anyway, been doing that for a couple years now and gotten used to it so i'm in no hurry to fix the brake.

I got the gear selector fixed the notched selector bracket was not part of the gt fender like I thought so I can still use the gt fenders for the front of rusty,

i want to use my blade deck arm as my hand break, but my lingage bends instead of presses the pad down, then i stoped worring about it becase my waiting to be locked transaxle is the one i have that uses the correct arm thing to connect to the rod with the spring.

@RockeyDA the one in the video you posted looks like a murray brake lever rather than a craftsman/ayp part, it looks identical to the one on my murray widebody.


tried once again to get running video of rusty, but no luck my brothers phone just refuses to do video for some reason, and I think I need to do some steering work, mostly the tie rod seems to be a little long and has the front wheels toed in making it darty, I was going to see if I could bend the rod a little to bring the wheels into alignment, but 1st I need to see if it's just a matter of off sized tires on the front, it has an 18 on one side and a 16 on the other

go on ebay and look up "nikon l105" i just got 2 on there, one for 9$ used another for 20$ new old stock. there a good boom for the buck, and if you compter stops wroking with it they record to normal SD cards and take AA batteries.

that link is for the same model of camra i have always used
just place a bid and set your max bid to 15$ or something and you will defiantly win, likely as the only bidder. well onless others on the foum compete with you.
if you go for it, this is the USB cable you will need if you want to pull pictures off the camra without a separate SD card reader
https://www.ebay.com/itm/3-3ft-USB-PC-Data-Sync-Cable-Cord-For-Nikon-Coolpix-L105-S600-S620-camera/163257379334?hash=item2602e5ea06:g:kYsAAOSw5WVbm2qn:rk:20

if your not going for this let me know, because i have another friend looking for one but he already has a working camra, he just wants an upgrade, so im only giving him this link if you dont go for it.