JD 220C reel and bearing replacement

2678 Views 17 Replies 6 Participants Last post by kur1j, Apr 11, 2018

kur1j

Discussion Starter · Apr 5, 2018

So late last year (really late) I hit the curb with my reel mower bedknife

. It broke the bedknife and in the process jammed the reel and busted the reel. It was late in the season and I was basically done mowing for the year.

It's about time to start mowing again so I'm out here working on it to get it back together.

I've got the bearings replaced and put back in their housing and housings back on the reel (wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be). The shaft in the bearing isn't super tight and it slipped on pretty easily. The question I have is that about the shaft of the reel spinning in the bearing instead of the bearing spinning on the shaft.

For reference part 39 is the bearing and rolls inside of part 40. Since the shaft is not super tight on the inside of the bearing (or doesn't seem to be) I'm worried that the shaft is just spinning within the bearing and not the bearing spinning.

I tried to make sure the grease was off the shaft and not inside the bearing but I'm sure some residual amount was still on it. However at this point I question if it is a concern at all?

Eventually I would assume it would have enough friction after spinning some to wear the grease off, heat up slightly and expand some causing it to become tighter.

Spinning the reel by hand I can't tell 100% sure if the bearing is spinning or the shaft is spinning in the bearing, but to me it's spinning freely with little to no resistance, so it's not like the bearings are frozen or something (all new bearings on both sides).

Should I revisit this? Should I check something else?

https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS590US590&hl=en-US&ei=RCzGWrz7FI2w_QanyL-YAw&q=john+deere+220c+reel+diagram&oq=john+deere+220c+reel+diagram&gs_l=mobile-gws-serp.3...2271.3625..4207...0....201.1395.0j7j1..........1..mobile-gws-wiz-serp.......0i71j33i160j33i21.5DtpDKe2b9Q%3D#imgrc=WBPgWFAcPRrUTM

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #3 · Apr 5, 2018

Ah yeah, fair enough.

Calling @Pete1313.

I guess I just need to know how to make sure the bearing is on correctly.

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #5 · Apr 5, 2018

Pete1313 said:
Your good. The tapered bearing cones just slide right on. No press fit. Part #34 retaining clip holds the cone in place on one side, and part #44 compression spring puts preload on everything once it is assembled by putting pressure on spacers #63 and #64. It's the preload pressure that causes the inner part of the bearing(one side with pressure from the clip and the other side with pressure on the spacer) to spin with the reel shaft once assembled. Hope that makes sense. Lmk if you have any other questions. Also check out my rebuild thread if you haven't already.

https://thelawnforum.com/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=1500

I had not! That is an amazing write up! I'm actuslly using the JD documentation and it is pretty good. Yours is is just as good as theirs or better though. With both options I don't think I'll have a problem. I'm in the process of reassembly at this point. I have the GTC on mine so it's got more gears and crap in the way.

The part I did noticed after looking through your post, and I think I screwed up is the fact that i put a seal on the NON chain side. When I was looking at it last night I saw that the documentation didn't show the inclusion of the seal! It made no sense to me why they left it out and honestly though it was a mistake! Without the sealit I felt it could easily collect tons of debris and to me it was obvious that it was just a mistake! But apparently not!

Would it be bad if I left that seal? Everything seems to fit correctly.

Also you call out the grease from JD. When I was looking around for grease online I ended up with this stuff which is what I used. Luca Oil Xtra Heavy duty grease. Not sure if I just ruined it with that grease or not. But it had similar consistency. It says it's NLGI 2. But not sure if that the same as the "poly" that D recommends.

https://www.google.com/search?q=lucas+xtra+heavy+grease&rlz=1CDGOYI_enUS590US590&hl=en-US&prmd=sivn&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjJlIbBv6PaAhXmdN8KHchsCe4Q_AUIEigC&biw=375&bih=712

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #7 · Apr 5, 2018

No, I'm talking about in the housing itself for the reel.

If you look at this breakout.

On the gear side it goes seal->bearing cup -> bearing -> seal

On the non gear side it goes seal->bearing cup -> bearing -> spacer->spacer (or if GTC a gear like on mine). There is no back side of the bearing seal on this side.

I ended up ordering 1 seal (the original was mangled to hell when i was getting it out) and the other was okay. I thought it was just missing so I put the seal on both sides even though apparently I wasn't supposed to? Seems really odd to me that they wouldn't include a seal.

As for the grease I used the same #2 grease. I couldn't find anything explicit stating a different type of grease was supposed to be used. Granted this is a 220c so it's a different unit so that could possibly be it? The grease I took out of it has basically the same visccoscity from what I can see.

https://imgur.com/a/ixjPc

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #9 · Apr 6, 2018

@Pete1313

Ugh damnit. Thanks for the reply. I guess that's what I get for not listening to the instructions. Now I have to figure out how to get the stupid out which was the hardest part haha.

I still don't quite see how that seal wouldn't be needed and how it would "share grease". That's a pretty large chamber in the house and stuff to fill up before any grease would come in contact with the gear or any of those components. I dunno just my thought.

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #11 · Apr 7, 2018

@Pete1313

Thanks for the detailed response! Yeah I see that from what you are explaining.

I guess it won't matter if the grease is in the housing? I can certainly see that filling up over time just as you put more grease in it. I would assume anyways.

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #12 · Apr 7, 2018

@Pete1313

I got it all back together! The only thing that I think I'm missing is the seal (part 25 on second picture) on the GTC enclosure. I'm 100% positive that it wasn't on it originally when I took it apart. I just think whoever had it before me didn't put it back. I'll order one and put it in it since it will be quick loosening the bolts and then slipping it on.

The only other thing now is the engine not running as smoothly as I would like. It seems to really struggle at low RPM even running and at high RPM it's surging.

I'm debating on just replacing the entire carb. Any suggestions?

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #14 · Apr 8, 2018

J_nick said:
It sounds alright to me. A little surging is normal, once there's a load on the engine it should go away.

But the bigger problem is it won't hardly even run at < 1/2 throttle. It just kind of dies. If I drop it down to an idle it won't run at all. I would like to run it at 1/2 to 3/4 throttle so I'm not running after the thing.

I was thinking of pulling the carb off of if but for 50$ for a new carb not sure it's worth the time to spend hours taking it apart and trying to clean it.

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kur1j

Discussion Starter · #18 · Apr 11, 2018

So I worked on this the other day and happy to report it's working quite well now after cleaning out the jets.

https://youtu.be/dfXwvgG-M24

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