1811 front axle work
 

I already rebuilt the steering box on Gracie, my 1811, but the steering was still pretty sloppy. I looked closer and notice quite a few worn out parts in the front end so I decided to tighter her up.

First the wheel bearings were very worn so I ordered a set of 4 for $40. I got HD-Switch brand off ebay and they seem fine. Installation was easy, I don't have a long enough punch to drive out the old bearings so I used a short piece of rebar. Driving the new bearings in was tricky because they can get cocked to one side. I could have driven them on one at a time with the wheel slid on the axle to keep the bearings going in straight. My press would have worked well also but it is buried so I relied on a large socket and a mallet.

I removed the axle bolt and noticed two problems. The bolt shoulder was too short so the threads dug into the axle and the bolt was worn away by the axle bearing surfaces. See first two pics. I bought a grade 8, 3/4" X 6" bolt from TSC which is a little too long but worked well since I added an extra nut due to the bolt not being drilled for the cotter pin. I polished the bolt shoulder up a bit with some 320 grit. See pic.

The 1811 has wobble stop bolts for the axle and mine had worn out heads and they had dug into the axle, dishing it out. I removed the bolts and smoothed out the heads with my bench grinder and a file. The dished out spots were filed down by hand with a good sharp file. I finished the filed areas with some gloss black primer-paint. Also painted bolt heads.

I used a cheap trick on the tie rod ends to tighten them up. Remove them from the rod, put them on an anvil and whack them with a hammer a few times. It seemed to work but new ones aren't expensive so I'll replace them at some point. There is a cub fanatic with steering repair tips at a page called: Garden-tractor-pulling-tips. The link doesn't work but I'll probably learn why very soon.

I put the axle back in with the new bolt and tightened it until it was snug but could still pivot easily. Then I greased the wobble-bolt heads and the wear surface on the axle before adjusting them to just touch the axle. Finished it up with several pumps of grease into the zerk.

I hope this info was informative.

Garden tractor pulling tips is a page run by a man who's name we don't use here unless we are swearing. His page link is not allowed here, and we strongly suggest you stay away from him and his information. You can learn just as much by researching elsewhere. For the life of me, I don't know how his page makes it to the top of any Cub Cadet searches, but it does.

Glad you got the front axle tighten up.

Good work thus far! I do recommend going ahead and getting tie rod ends when you can. Tweaking them on an anvil is only a temp fix, you just distorted the female sphere, no way to make it uniformly tight. I have had the displeasure for one of them to pop out while riding at full speed--not fun.:bigeyes: