Originally Posted by Ol' Bob
Oh yeah, I also had to get all eight pieces of bolt out of the holes in the ring gear. Well, that old model ring gear is gone, replaced with the 10mm bolt version.
What I learned is this: my Cub Cadet is a '90s tractor, but that front axle design is an old Case front diff that Mitsubishi made starting in 1964. I had wondered why that year was embossed in the castings in three places. Case had discontinued it so Mitsubishi sold it to MTD, who had bought the Cub Cadet name (I think from International Harvester). Mitsubishi had made minor changes such as the stronger bolts. Another thing I learned too late was, if you buy the parts as Case parts, they are considerably cheaper than if you get it with the Cub Cadet name. In any event, Cub or Case, the part you get comes from Mitsubishi.
How I learned all this is, in my order of bolts the first time I fixed the front diff, I got the 10mm bolts from Cub Cadet, when I needed 8mms for the old style ring gear. When I ordered parts the second time I had to fix it, that time with the proper ring gear, I didn't get the bolts at all with the parts order. They UPSed them to me later and they screwed up and sent me the 8mm bolts, when now I needed the 10s. That is how I found out that the smaller bolts were for a Case tractor. At this point I said, "frog it," and went to a fastener company and bought 10mm 8.8 hardness bolts generically.
(It just hit me that the repair shop probably ordered the wrong 'Case' ring gear to save some money, and then said, "screw it," and just winged it with the smaller, doomed to fail, bolts. They knew they were working for a rich guy who didn't mind spending. They probably expected he would be bringing it back for another repair and they'd charge him to fix it again. I went in there and questioned them and they told me they'd let that mechanic go. Every time I was in there, they always had a new mechanic! Well, the whole shootin' match is long gone now.)
I can't complain that I was given a tractor. I do wish it wasn't a Cub Cadet.
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