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All this talk about axle tubes


perry

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I went off and broke mine yesterday on my trusty landlord B) I have a muffler clamp around the tubes on my two wood hauler tractors but never put one on the plow tractor

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well i guess it was due since this is the first major break down over the 8 yrs i have owed the tractor. and its had a hard 8yrs plowing this wicked driveway. it lived a easy life before i got it mowing grass in a luxurious old money big home neighborhood. had about 2 more hours to plow so i transferred the blade over to the the Allis B-110 . good thing the Allis was all ready setup with weights and chains. felt kinda weird being outside of a cab plowing snow , whats the deal with this wind and snow hitting your face ? i don't like it ...... :Danother reason to have more than one tractor. time to yank the cab off and pull the trans. good thing i have spares ;).TRACTORS001_zpsee11b1d8.jpgTRACTORS003_zps0693b285.jpgTRACTORS005_zps9b55e095.jpg

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If someone pops the clutch hard in forward, then pops it hard again when going into reverse, and does this over and over for years, it will fatigue the tube. It is very obvious on most of the tube failures because a torsional(twisting) fatigue failure will cause the tube to fail along a line about 45 degrees to the axis of the tube. Most that I have seen have unrolled much like a paper towel roll when you try to pull one apart.

Chains and wheel weights are a prime contributing factor to this type of failure also. If the wheels are not allowed to spin when the clutch is released suddenly, then all the load goes into trying to twist the axle tube. Because of the weight of the tractor, it is not going to move anywhere nearly as fast as the load is applied to the tube and since the wheels can't spin, the load twists the axle tube like winding up a spring. Because of the strength and hardness of the tube, the twisting is not really noticeable and it goes back to its normal state when the load is removed. Any time someone uses chains and heavy wheel weights to prevent the wheels from spinning at all, they are accelerating the rate of fatigue within the tube. It is like bending a wire back and forth, eventually when it has been cycled hard enough and enough times, it will break. This is what is happening to the tubes.

Many people, over the years, have asked why the factory put the turf tires on all the tractors. Duh! The engineers knew that if the wheels are not allowed to spin when hit with a sudden load it will put extreme forces on the drive tube and will eventually cause a fatigue failure. Turf tires spin on the ground and prevent this high loading from happening. The engineers most likely also computed the number of cycles required to cause fatigue failure of the axle tube and made the tube strong enough to last quite a while after the warranty was run out. After all these tractors were not designed to last "forever", or even for 20 years for that matter.

Chassis weight does not cause this to happen unless the weight is heavy enough to totally prevent the wheels from spinning at all. A bending load from chassis weight will usually cause a nearly straight break across the tube, not on a 45 degree angle like a torsional fatigue failure.

The tube failure also happens on hydros and shuttles. It is the same thing, the rapid application of power to the axle tube in both forward and backward directions. Most people do this and think this tractor is just going to take it. And yes, it does for 30-40 years, but eventually breaks.

I use chassis weights and apply them only when needed. I am also careful to try and engage the clutch or hydro at a slow smooth rate. At times I do tend to abuse my equipment, but pulling a tranny to replace a broken tube is not a task that I look forward to. (fingers crossed) I have not broken a drive tube on a Simplicity "yet", even after 20 years of tractor pulling.

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quote:Originally posted by Talntedmrgreen

Bummer...been there, and it sucks. Tranny's are cheap and easy to find, so I just started swapping the whole rear end.


id="quote">
id="quote">yep , i have two spare transmissions ^
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quote:Originally posted by HubbardRA

If someone pops the clutch hard in forward, then pops it hard again when going into reverse, and does this over and over for years, Chains and wheel weights are a prime contributing factor to this type of failure also. If the wheels are not allowed to spin when the clutch is released suddenly,


id="quote">
id="quote">that sounds about what happen to me. this is the first year i am running filled tires , no weights. i have ice cleat chains. i know the tires need to have some slipping . i caught a spot of gravel off the ice and there the tube went. with the snow so wet and building up , i was plowing some short spots in my driveway side to side instead of the long runs i usually do . so lots of 3rd to reverse shifting. after being out there all day i get real tired of plowing and was in a hurry to move the snow. i can see 8yrs of rough plowing stressing the tube. one year i had a set of wards 62lb weights on each side of this tractor. i plowed 15min and said no way , i could tell it got way to much traction something was going to break. these tractors get very good traction in the dirt and grass with cleated chains on. i can feel it when coming up to a snow mound in the yard and hit a patch of grass, sends ya flying up the mound , makes for some nice tall snow mounds :D.
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In spite of the cost of used trans vs replacing tubes, when I broke one it seemed pretty clear to me to get a new zero-time tube. For the most part replacing a high impact part with a used one has risks since it is hard to tell if the previous person(s) had abused it or not. Some times used is good, others it can be too much risk.

While we are on the subject, has anyone come up with a solution for rapidly loosening left hubs?

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I have been running simplicity tractors since the 60's and never have I ever broken a axel did break a bunch of shear pins in the hub on a wonderboy 700 but that was plowing in the garden . Still using simplicity tractors and hope to never break one.Bob

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Nice write up Rodney on reasons why axle tubes fail. That makes a lot of sense. I have moved from when weights to a weight bracket on the front or rear depending on what im doing. Brackets thanks to Ray. There is a lot of rotating mass when you have 50-75lbs in each wheel.

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I use a 2 1/2 gallon pail filled with concrete for a counterbalance for the snowplow/snowblower on my landlord & no problems with axle breakage. I have broken axle from trying to scrape ice of my blacktop with my blade & wont do the again

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