Mainline tiller changed gear oil now power lever slips

Hi,

We have a Mainline tiller with two blade mower attachment that we bought in 1990.

Recently I changed the transmission gear oil that had not been done in many years, and certainly not the 300 hours as the manual suggests.
I used a 6 dollar product from tractor supply, Traveller all-purpose 80W-90 gear oil and now the left power lever that changes from speed 1 speed 2 forward, reverse 1 reverse 2 goes freely back and forth, but will occasionally settle into one of the speeds if I move the speed lever a few times all while engine is off. When I start the engine and try to move the power lever in speed 1, the machine will go for a bit then stop moving. If I move it to speed 2, it goes along normally at that speed. I can also engage the blade and mow in speed 2, but same problem when blade is engaged, the machine will go a few feet then stop moving forward.
My husband had the tiller attachment on recently and the usual happened, gear noises and mumblings coming from the garden. He adjusted the clutch cable, which seems to be something he has to do every year upon first use. I had my own way of getting it to engage without clutch noises by moving the machine forward a few feet, pull the lever to engage, and if there is any resistance I push the lever away again and move the machine forward a few feet, stop, and try again. After doing this a few times the clutch will unstick and the lever engages just fine. Just wanted to give you the background on any symptoms of the machine before I changed the gear oil. My husband asked me specifically what did I remove to drain the gear oil, and I said the large blue painted plug on the side of the machine, next to a red painted bolt. He was thinking I undid a bolt, but I didn't. The manual doesn't show which is the gear drain plug on our machine, but my husband had a look at it and concurred that I chose the right plug, and not the engine oil drain plug or some bolt.

Gee, what wrong word am I using at this forum! Keep having to edit. Hopefully this gets through. Thanks for having a look.

Hmm, looks like the problem was my photo sharing name, keepandshare or maybe not.

Here's a picture of what I was trying to post.

for some reason, keep and share as one word is not acceptable.

I should have known I picked the wrong part to remove. Turned out I removed the big blue painted bolt that has a rubber o-ring, steel spring, and a ball bearing that according to my husband acts as a detent for the speed lever. I had to retreive the o-ring and bearing. I got a piece of old window screen and strained the container I had poured the used gear oil in. The ball bearing finally plopped out and I was happy. I found the o-ring still stuck to the container I had drained the oil in.

If I had paid attention to the small drawing in the manual, I would have known what bolt/plug was the gear oil drain - one of two red painted bolts. Will be re-installing these parts tomorrow and putting fresh 90W gear oil back in.

Good for you for getting it sorted.

Hi, beastlytiller: Great trouble shooting. Lots of times people can't recall exactly what they did before a problem started. I think you found a procedure error (lost a part or two) which also included pulling out the wrong item. Good work. Presence of mind is worth while! Just me talking, since "I don't have a dog in this race".

Dennis M. in W. Tenn.

Thanks for the encouraging words Duner WI and DMartin! As I said, I saw three bolts, two red painted ones on equal sides of the transmission and one larger blue painted bolt next to one of the red bolts. I'm familiar with tamper-proof paint and thought red means don't bother with those.

In case anyone else has the same machine but no manuals, here's what I have on this particular machine for this particular situation. The exploded views of the parts in question were on two separate views and my engineer husband was somewhat confused, but then understood it.

Not the first time I have done this. Changing the oil in the MR2 Sports car, the drain plug washer fell into the oil drain pan and when I put in new oil and tightened up the plug, the oil started leaking under the car and my husband starts telling me to turn the engine off, that it was leaking slightly. Now I know to check and make sure the metal washer doesn't get lost when I change the oil and oil filter.
Take care!

Just a general rule of thumb. For the stuff I have worked on since around 1956.
Either draw a little diagram or take a copious amount of smartphone pictres.
Take pictures of EVERYTHING you can possbly imagine. Two examples. The glass
washer I was just working on and one of my lawn tractors. You can NEVER take
too many pictures. When you are done just erase them. There are two sets of
numbers on this Walbro carb. A good smartphone is one heck of a tool. I even
keep over 100 PDF files of manuals in the phone for equipment I work on. Very
handy.

Hi jeffcat,

I like your advice and most of the time do the same. I recently worked on a Kitchen Aid mixer, overseen by my husband, and drew a sketch of the control board wiring diagram to make sure I got the wires onto their connectors correctly after removing the control unit and reassembling it. No fun having an extra wire go somewhere you have no idea where, or parts left over after say, taking a laptop apart and reassembling it (been there, done that).

Never thought of taking a picture of the part with the manufacturers number, but I usually write it down for reference if I need to order one.
Thanks for the tip!

This picture doesn't show that much but it is the ignition controller in an
oven. Had to unhook them all and twenty minutes latter I plugged them back in.
Very handy. You fooling with a K-5 or K-6 unit or the smaller Artisan unit?
Biggest trouble is people overload them. You only need a board. You should see
what happens to a model A- 400 or a full size 60 quart commercial unit when
they rip the crap out of the transmission. If lucky they shear the key. The A-
400 is a really big table top unit and most of the time they destroy the top
gear that drives the orbital. Commercial mixers are 220 three phase and have
ten hp motors with ten matched v belts. Big stuff.

Hold on there. What you dropped in the oil might have been a crush ring. You
really should replace it at every oil change. They are cheep enough.