I have a self-propelled leaf blower/vac. The wheels are driven by a belt that goes down from the horizontal shaft of the engine, turns horizontal to go under the deck, and turns vertical again to drive the axle. All that turning is problematic and the belt keeps coming off. This is a blower that I reconstructed from the parts of 2 scrapped ones. Same model, so no fabrication involved, just bolting together. At first I thought that I had gotten something oriented wrong, but I've ruled that out (most parts only go one way and I have a parts diagram that agrees). Here is a picture of the underside. The arrow points to the spot on a pulley where the belt "enters" it at an angle. Of course, the belt wants to climb up the side of the pulley and come off. I just don't get how this can work. My first impulse is to fix it by changing something. But this is the way that it came from the factory and it should work. What am I missing? Thanks, Bob

Not seen that particular one before, but all pieces of gear have seen/had that used such an arrangement had some additional guides to restrict the belt from side movement. I notice some holes in the above bracket at about the right position; wonder if there aren't some missing such pieces here...

I see that you have the problem fixed, but just in case, here's another thought: I have several old Cub Cadet garden tractors that turn a belt 90 degrees to move power from the horizontal engine shaft to vertical driven pulley on the mower deck. Most of the time when a belt comes off it's because the belt itself is bad. Sometimes I have to look closely to find the defect. --------------- I overloaded the vee belt that drives the hydraulic pump I added to my tractor and broke the internal cords on one side. The belt still looked the same and ran straight without a load, but any loading made it instantly roll ~90 degrees and then slip. The only evidence is that the broken side stretches freely when the belt is bent sideways. The fix was a new pump of 2/3 the displacement, spinning faster. -jsw

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What am I missing? (leaf blower problem)

Jan 03, 2015 22 Replies

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Jim Wilkins 11 years ago

---------------

I overloaded the vee belt that drives the hydraulic pump I added to my tractor and broke the internal cords on one side. The belt still looked the same and ran straight without a load, but any loading made it instantly roll ~90 degrees and then slip.

The only evidence is that the broken side stretches freely when the belt is bent sideways.

The fix was a new pump of 2/3 the displacement, spinning faster.

-jsw

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Steve W. 11 years ago

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Martin Eastburn 11 years ago

My large mowers have 1/8" hard wire bolted to the chassis and over the belt - keeping the belt between the loop of the wire on both sides. As pressure on the belt (from motor or wheels) the belt tends to shorten on one end and lengthen on the other for the start up. Belt jerks are common. These loops are then more like 7 or a z where the bottom bolts on and the vertical section goes over the height of the pulley and the wire bends over the pulley. keeps the belt with some slack on the pulley. And so on.

Martin

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