Most of the 1st Garden tractor were not shaft driven, Many of the first field Tractors were not even shaft driven. The ST54 is a Lawn tractor with a K46 transmission and Bigger rear and front tires

A belt transfer horsepower more efficiently than a drive shaft, but belts do wear over time and lose some of that advantage. But you can replace that belt and gain that advantage back. Shafts are usually constant and don't need to be replaced that often. The 1st IH Cub Cadet garden tractor was belt-to-shaft. Why do you think IH stayed with a mule drive for mowing and many attachments! While they did look at doing what Bolens did with shaft-driven mowing decks for the 70/100 and decided their design couldn't support a shaft-driven mowing deck (easier for mowing deck changeover than a Mule drive). Wheel horse, while they did make some shaft-driven garden tractors. A majority of their garden tractors were belt-driven until Toro (which bought Wheel Horse in 1986) stopped production of lawn and garden tractors. Their 5Xi production was stopped before the 400XT series.

I replaced the drive belt when my John Deere GX335 was 15 years old. Not the norm; usually I have had to replace a drive belt about every 9 to 10 years on many of my belt-driven machines. I prefer shaft-driven just because it's one less thing to replace , but I do currently have 5 belt-driven garden tractors and one is an IH Cub Cadet (original model); the others are a Wheel Horse 416H; a Deere 110 Round Fender; a Deere 112 Square Fender; and a Deere GX335. I also have one Garden tractor that is Hydraulic driven a Ingersoll 3016PS No shaft or Belt . I have Two IH shaft driven, 2 MTD Cub Shaft driven 2 Deere shaft driven and 1 MTD/White Shaft driven :ThumbsUp:

While it's certainly true the Original started with a belt (albeit a small one, functioning more as an adapter between the engine and driveshaft), what's the weakest point of the original's drivetrain? :bigthink:

The drive sheaves themselves our the weakest point :ThumbsUp:

I don't see how a belt can be more efficient than a shaft. I'm thinking that most manufacturers use belt drive because they use vertical engines because they are cheaper.

In commercial HVAC, manufacturers are getting away from belt driven fans and going direct drive to meet efficiency standards + they are a lot less maintenance.

After I got my first 3000 series machine I never liked the mule drive system that Cub uses on all their other equipment. I just don't like the design of twisting belts like that to transfer power. I'm sure that was one of the reasons why the 3k machines ended because of the cost to build them. They slowly took off the nice stuff like tilt wheel and rear lights but they were still too expensive for the consumers.

If you look at Scag, their top machine the Turf Tiger uses a horizontal engine with a shaft driven deck. Every other Scag uses a vertical engine with a belt driven deck.

Rant over.....:biggrin2:, just my:TwoCents:

Shaft drives lose 20 to 25% of the engine's horsepower by the time they transfer it back to the rear transmission. Chain drives actually transfer Horsepower Better than a Belt Wheel Horse's 1st Zero turns Had Chain drives to the Transmission, a Chain only loses about 4% of engine Horsepower during transfer. Belts only lose 9 to 15% of engine horsepower during transfer. But belts do wear out and need to be changed. Yes, the belt is a cost savings over a shaft, but it also has an advantage over the shaft. But you didn't need to change out a shaft as often as a belt. But the PTO on the 3000 series is still belt-driven Deere used the same design In their 400, 420, and 430 Belt from engine to stub shaft to shaft back to belt on the deck. Shaft drives don't offer a shock-absorbing value like a belt does, That why you don't see many shafts driven from gear box to gear box on a mowing deck. Walker offers that on some of their decks, but you have to be careful running them with hidden obstacles because when the blades hit something it can destroy that gear box.

The shaft just offers less maintenance over a belt system, That's why you don't see belt drives in the subcompact and above tractors. It would kind of suck to have to change a drive belt out on a row crop tractor in the middle of a row.

Until 2008, almost all Deere Harvesters (Corn Pickers and Combines) everything on it was Belt driven except for the drive shaft to the transmission. You can get fully shaft-driven to gear-box in harvesters now in certain models.

Yes, the belt related componentry. I think you're right that you could make a great commercial belt drive machine (i.e. many ZTRs) but the residential stuff we see uses it for cost savings, not reliability or efficiency. :beerchug:

That statement That it' just for a cost savings measure is not always true

Wheel Horse: The majority of their tractors were belt driven, and it actually had nothing to do with cost savings; they made some shaft drives. But a majority were belt-driven Machines I interviewed the late Cecil Pond just before he past and I asked why he used belt drives instead of shaft and His response was that belts transfer horsepower more efficiently than shaft drives.
Some customers wanted shaft so he made the D series. Because they assumed that shafts were better.

Again, Deere used a belt drive, not as a cost-saving measure with the 110 RF, but again it was Horsepower transfer. Belts transfer horsepower more efficiently.

In 1968, the JD 140 came out But that was more due to customer (dealer) request and, do in part, to misleading advertising by companies like IH and Bolens who would talk about the efficiency of the shaft drive for power transfer. And part of that was justified by what manufacturers had made belts from in the past for their products at that time. Even going by today's standards, a belt is manufactured better today than it was in the 1960s.

The John Deere X950R tractor is for Europe only. It is shaft-driven to the angle gear box and belt-driven to the wheel motors.

Just because of the Cub Cadet 1100/482 and 582 special were using a shaft to right-angle gear box and a belt to transmission for their lower-cost models doesn't mean that the design is a cost-saving measure for other manufacturers that used a similar design. The Simplicity, Sovereign used that throughout its whole production, but part of that was due to the transmission they used. But it also brought with it a shock-absorbing value to their design as well. That type of statement also comes from the thinking that because MTD uses a belt in their lower-cost Cub Garden tractors, it is just a cost savings for every other manufacturer as well.

The Deere X500 series is much more ergonomically friendly than a GTX2000 or an XT3 series. And the Tuff-torq K72 actually put more torque to the ground than a shaft driven BDU 10 with Cub Cadet final drive.

BDU 10 with Cub Cadet final drive axle torque of 286 lb-ft. and the K72 will provide an axle torque of 405 lb -ft

So a shaft driven transmission is not always the best thing to have.

All the shaft does is make the drive line less of an Issue than a belt. Where you might have to change a belt every 10 years, a shaft may never need to be changed in the life of a machine. But when a shaft goes, it can be a very expensive fix, even time-consuming, depending on what components are in the way of the drive shaft.

John Deere X950R Shaft to angle gear Box belt to wheel Motors

When I got my first "O", the transmission had sheared off gear teeth. I got another transmission given to me and it had sheared off gear teeth. I finally ordered a set of gears off of Ebay and replaced them and all has been well. I used the O with the belt that had come with it when I bought it. It (and the rest of the tractor) looked like hell after having sat in the woods for many years after someone had ruined the trans ... probably pulling.



I only replaced the belt when I swapped out the clutch/driveshaft out for another issue.



While I'm a huge fan of the all metal driveline, I am amazed by the strength and durability of a belt.

In modern lawn tractors, the belt will likely outlive the rest of the crummy MTD quality driveline parts.