putting up the mowers

[jerrell 1]

:banghead: i was mowing the yard the other day and it was quite dusty with a little wet grass in spots and i knew i had to wash under the mower as the acid in the grass would eventually rust the deck , so i got the thinking to really clean that thing i had to take it off and didn't want to do that , may need it again. so went to th shop found an old garden hose , cut the end that connect to fawcet and streached it over a small pvc pipe with holes drilled it it. dug a small 1 inch wide strip in the ditch and covered both ends to keep it stable , turned the hose on and drove the mower over it and started it up.... it works great... :horseplay: no bending or removing the deck,

[JimD 3,345]

i don't have anything that sofisicated (yet), but a couple of times a summer i get a nice puddle in the yard that works good too. lol. drop the the deck ,engage the blades and watch the stuff fly out of there.

[KyBlue 655]

thats a Good Idear right there!!!

[BairleaFarm 340]

I actually all ready took mine off and cleaned it up for the season. I think I may have to get it back out.

[Sarge 3,464]

I ran across an interesting solution to washing out the deck - John Deere . Their newer mowers have an option of a deck washing nozzle system with quick connects - works excellent . Weird part is, the price . One nozzle, retaining bolt (self-threading sheet metal type) and 3/4" garden hose quick-connect - $5.32 from the local JD dealer . Took about all of 5 minutes to install , I put one on each side near the baffles and it works awesome - no matter how wet the grass was when I mowed ! It will , however, not remove dried up debris that is hardened unless you're willing to waste a lot of water ...

I'll have to post up some pics ,

Sarge

[jerrell 1]

:USA: i think the amount of water you get under the deck is the answer to loosening the built up dirt, with more water the blades will beat that stuff out of there, i had big old chunks fly out when i turned the water up all the way . and running it over a puddle is a good ideal also , you can empty the puddle and clean the mower also now if i could come up with some way of squirting oil in that tube i wouldn't make such a mess when i pull it off for the winter.

[TT-(Moderator) 1,147]

The old Bolens tube frame decks had the water hose fitting starting way back in the late 60's.

I "borrowed" this photo from ebay:

[Sarge 3,464]

Leave it to TT , I knew someone had that feature years ago, just couldn't remember what brand .

Need to recoat mine this winter with a fresh coat of Slip Plate .

Sarge

[linen beige 14]

I almost hate to admit this, but I usually have my mower shut down and locked into it's shed within a minute of finishing the cutting. I only bother cleaning the hardened dry grass out from under it when I sharpen the blades in the spring. The deck I use is now eleven years old and shows only a fine hint of hard surface rust underneath, but a lot of the metal that has lost it's paint actually has a shine. And it's a recycling mulching deck with the discharge chute plugged shut. I've never had a mower that has spent it's life in this area to rust out, yet a couple of the ones I've picked up from north of here do have cancer of the baffles. Must be the high lime content of our soil? :banghead:

[bdanie7 0]

I just put together a new deck more my dads "of brand" lawn mower. He spent over 400 dollars on a new shell. It is only 8 years old,p.o.s. my question is, has anyone ever tried the spray on bedliner material on a deck, or would it protect it any? before I start pricing the stuff, I wanted to know if it even worked. Thanks for any help.

[jerrell 1]

:banghead: not to dampen your ideal but like linen beige posted these things last forever, i understand that bedliner is pretty expensive and may be overkill, mine is old,(year unknown) but has to be over ten yr, and hardly any rust at all, i just like to clean the tractor and mower after mowing or plowing , gets quite dusty down here, also don't want a build up for rust to start. jerry

[Stigian 1,234]

I quite like the "clean it in a puddle" idea

One more cut and the lawn will be sorted for this year, then off to find a big puddle :USA:

[Jim_M 179]

I just put together a new deck more my dads "of brand" lawn mower. He spent over 400 dollars on a new shell. It is only 8 years old,p.o.s. my question is, has anyone ever tried the spray on bedliner material on a deck, or would it protect it any? before I start pricing the stuff, I wanted to know if it even worked. Thanks for any help.

I have a 48" deck that's had the bottom side painted with POR-15. That stuff is so slick that the grass won't stick to it once it's dried, it falls out in big clumps on the floor. It's very hard too. I've owned that deck for 5 or 6 years and it still looks the same underneath.