If you are right you could get a close measurement by removing the drag link. Turn the steering to the middle. Then meausring the distance between the steering holes. Make a drag link of the right size. You can buy the individual steering joints (tie rod ends). A number of places them. You can use tubing with head cut off bolts welded to the tubing or round rod with treads cut into it. The original owner may have just used a drag link he had to fix the tractor. Roger

 

I just measured mine and its around 24 inches but I
have bent mine about a 1/4 inch to fix the same problem you are having.
Here is a picture. Also how are the bushing in the steering gear.
I got tired of the plastic ones not helping so I made an
improvement to that also. I have two GT6000's and on the
2nd one I made an adjustable drag link.

 

Here is another picture of my GT's with steering mods

 

Wow! That looks great fxrs55. Especially the adjustable one. Unfortunately, I don't have the right tools to make one, but I may give the bent version a try. Glad to know I'm not going crazy.

 

I have been designing an adjustable assembly that all
someone that can't make the adjustable one like I did
can take what I may make a few kits of and with
just a hacksaw to cut the drag link and install this
kit.

 

What the heck, Is that all one sentence?

 

I don't know why but so far all of my Sears and Craftsman mowers have had the factory steering to allow turning left sharper than turning right. It is just the way they made them. They say to mow in a counterclockwise direction making left turns instead of right turns. Obviously the discharge chute is on the right side of all my tractors so you don't want to get bogged down while mowing.

 

I don't know why but so far all of my Sears and Craftsman mowers have had the factory steering to allow turning left sharper than turning right. It is just the way they made them. They say to mow in a counterclockwise direction making left turns instead of right turns. Obviously the discharge chute is on the right side of all my tractors so you don't want to get bogged down while mowing.

I think that is the answer right there.. The first cuts of the lawn are clockwise, throwing the cuttings to the center and not off the lawn into the street or on the sidewalk. After two circuits you switch directions to counterclockwise and throw grass toward the edge of the lawn to not get a big buildup in the middle. The turns need to get tighter as you get to the center so they made the mowers turn tighter going CCW.

Rob

 

With tractors being advertised with their turning radius
as one of their selling points I don't think the Gt6000's
were made to turn less to the right. The tractor is made
to do other things beside cutting grass. Doing any other
job like snow blowing or pushing dirt with the dozer blade and so on
you would want it to turn as sharp as possible in either direction.
I think its just a poor design that only gets worse
over time as the bushing wear out and any other steering
part starts to wear and get sloppy. I was able to get one of mine to
turn in both directions all most the same by bending the
one end of the drag link about 1/4". I bought one of mine
new back in 1993 and I know it turned in both directions about
the same when it was new. Over time with wear the steering
got sloppy and right turns were not as tight. I believe when
I bent the drag link that 1/4" it probably put the curve on
that end back close to were it was.

 

Hi All,

I had a question for fxrs55 and your bushing setup and i think you may have some bad part numbers (figure i post in case someone else orders the parts like i did).

I purchased the part numbers you posted and the brass bushing will not fit into the stainless steel tube. I guess it is partly my fault for not checking the measurements of the parts

It looks like either when you added the part numbers you had a typo or McMaster changed things around.

Assuming the tube is correct 89495K455 it has an OD of 1in and ID of 7/8. The bushings 6391K265 is an Oil-Embedded Sleeve Bearing for 3/4" Shaft Diameter, 1" OD, 1" Length. Im looking at these two parts and i dont think the bearing will press into the sleeve (i have never done this in the past but am mechanically inclined and it doesn't look possible since they have both the same OD, also looking at your pictures my bearing has a much thicker wall)

SO i am thinking it needs to be a OD of 7/8 and ID of 3/4 (assuming the shaft is 3/4, i haven't confirmed measurements yet) that part number from McMaster is 6391K259 Oil-Embedded Sleeve Bearing for 3/4" Shaft Diameter, 7/8" OD, 1" Length. We would also require only 2.

So my questions are:

1. Do i need to use 4 bearings or would 2 be ok? Is it easier to press smaller ones and thats the reason to use 4?

2. Did you do this to both the sector gear and the longer bar that goes to the steering wheel also?

So reason i am doing this is in hopes to fix my sloppy steering. My first attempt was replacing all the bushings (the person i purchased for got and replaced the steering wheel shaft but no bushing) so i was hoping it just needed new bushing. When i replaced them it worked fine for 2 cuts about 2 hours of riding around with lots of turning, then went back to the way it was with the old bushing.

Besides those questions was wondering what else i should do, maybe replace the sector gear also? The teeth look ok and there is no where on the shaft except for some of the paint.

Thanks for your help.

-Peter

 

wrx137,
I checked my receipt and the part numbers are

6391k256 for the bushings.

89495k455 for the stainless tube.

here is the web site for the bushings

McMaster-Carr


here is the site for the tubing

McMaster-Carr


If you use the 1" long bushings you would only need 2.
I don't remember why I used 1/2" long bushings.

 

fxrs55 - I don't want to revive and old thread, but I wanted to let you know I used your solution on my GT5000 and it worked great. The steering is probably better than it was when the mower was new; and it's great to be able to turn left again.