bt101

I bought a used 6517 and I have a problem with the tiller. The PTO from the engine consists of a belt that is in the horizontal plane at the engine which twists to the vertical plane at the jackshaft. I've never seen such a ridiculous setup and I keep destroying belts. There are so many things wrong I don't know where to begin.

Firstly it is plain to see that the belt jumps and flops all over the place. The manual calls for the belt guides to be 1/16 from the pulleys, but c'mon, that motor pulley sticks way down and has at least 1/8 runout. This ain't no swiss watch and that runout coupled with the crazy 90 degree twist and the fact that the belt is unsupported for over a foot causes it to flop all over the place.

Even unloaded, a brand new belt starts shredding right away. After an hour of use, they just stretch and keep falling off the pulleys.

I'm using real expensive kevlar belts. I've tried the spec size and one inch smaller to get more tension and less flop. Same result.

Here's the part that kills me. I'm tilling hard ground so I have the depth set as shallow as I can get it. When the tiller really gets loaded down, the motor just fries the belt. With any motorized implement that I've used (such as a grass tractor/mower) when the tractor gets loaded when it gets into thick grass, the motor will slow or stall, it shouldn't bust the power train.

I've spent more time working on this thing than using it. I can't see how it can possibly work. Has anybody had any success with this type of PTO or is it some sort of joke that is not intended to work?