It would be pretty easy to fix the water pump while you have it apart for the camshaft. Also do the oil pump and governor gears at the same time. They are plastic. If it's in good cosmetic shape it's worth fixing.


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As ToD points out, depends on what the rest of the tractor looks like and also how you value your time.

It's a solid tractor but there is no doubt that it will require more maintenance and repairs than a new one.

 

The rest of the tractor is in decent shape. Of course the hood has some chunks broken out of it, but I guess that is common on these. How many hours does this model usually last for?

 

Pictures can tell more of the story. A water cooled engine can easily live to 2000 hours or more without major work. Yours already needs some work, and should have the plastic gears replaced, since they will fail at some point. The 345 does not have diff lock, but is otherwise a great lawn/garden tractor. There was one for sale in the PNW for under $2K recently. I believe it sold pretty quickly, but don't know what they got for it.

It all depends on what your real needs are and what your budget is. The 345 still has a lot of life left in it, so it would be a shame to scrap it. But, if you have to pay normal shop labor to fix it, you likely won't recoup that if you sell in a year or two. If you are planning on keeping it forever, it would likely be worth paying someone to fix it for you. If you have the ability and/or are willing to learn you could fix it for fewer $, but not of your time.

 

If I get it fixed I was planning on keeping and using it as long as I can. I like mowing with it and I have the snowblower attachment, too.

I was curious on how the E100 series are in comparison if I had to get a new mower. I'm assuming they might not match up considering how much the 345 originally went for.

 

The E100 compared to a 345?
The E100

......and The 345

 

The E100 series is significantly less of everything, $ and capability. The 345 is a garden tractor and is capable of significant work. The 100 series are best used as mowers on level ground that can be completed in an hour or two. They don't really make an equivalent of the 345 anymore (to get liquid cooling you have to do significantly up, to the X700 line) but something in the X500 series or possibly the higher end X300 series would be similar. The 345 has power steering and deck lift. Looks like X370 would be the minimum that is similar.

 

Yeah, if you are used to a 345, an E100 would be several steps down in everything.

 

For what its worth I traded my 1997 345 and to get basically the same tractor I ended up buying a X580. If the cam has not been replaced trade it before that happens. Mine went at 1146 hours on the 345 and the dealer repair was about $1000. I still used it another 4 years after that and got $1300 on trade for it. Roger

 

The 345 is the best lawn mowing machine I have ever owned. I currently have a gt235, 345, gx345 and x485, and without a doubt the 345 with power steering is nimble and the easiest to maneuver and cut with.
The x485 is a great machine for cutting, but is very heavy, large and not easy to get around things and change directions.

I've also owned a 318, lx279, lx188, gt262 and gt275. These tractors work well but do not compare to the ease of use of a 345 or gx345. The reason I like the 345 over the gx345 is I don't need to hold the PTO up when reversing.

BTW, a 2020 E100 is $1599 new and a 1998 345 was $7800 new. That alone will tell you what the better tractor is.

 

Ok, cool, that's what I figured. I do like mowing with the 345 a lot. The power steering is very nice.

 

Fix the 345.

 

Looking on Machine Finder, the 345s are between $1200 and $3K (there are some for more, but they are dreaming). So, getting the 345 fixed is probably a good idea. There are quite a few threads and videos of people who have done it before. Just replacing the cam and water pump is cheaper than some of the things that people do, because they are already in there and it will never be cheaper to do them (like replacing pistons and rings, boring the block, replacing the valves and/or the head and gaskets). Doing all of those things would give you a near new engine. Your engine has 900 hours on it, so some of those additional things might be a good idea. If you are doing the work yourself, it just adds to the time, but gives you more learning. If you are paying some $60+/hour to do them, it can pretty quickly become more than the cost of a new engine (at least an air cooled one) and cost more than someone else would likely be willing to pay for the machine. I would do a leakdown test on it to see what condition it is in. I did that on my 400 hour X534 and it measures as almost new with only 2% leakage, so there is no reason to take mine apart for a long time.

 

Fix the 345. I bought a 10 year old 265 with a 17 hp Kawasaki with 1000 hours on it. Put another 20 years on it with another 2000 hours, it just turned 30 and rolled over 3000 hours, and still runs great. I bought a new L120 and it lasted 3.5-4 years. When it died I complained to my dealer about the junk Depot JD's. She said they are made for 1/4 acre flat lots, and should last about 10 years. I was mowing 1.5 on a big hill. She said it served the hours it was built to do, I just used them all up in 3 years. Fix the 345, you may not get the hours out of yours I have, maybe I'm just lucky. But I never babied the 265. I pull a half cord fire wood trailer with it to stage my trailers for delivery, and I would stage my dump trailer with it, just not loaded. I have an X540 now to mow 5 lawns, 4 over an acre and 1 a 1/4 acre. If the 265 had power stearing and trac loc, it would do every thing my X540 does. That Yugo/Rolls is the beat analogy I could imagine, Joe.

 

Fix the 345.
I have a D110. I only got it because I got it for an amazing price. That's another story. The 345 is many times more machine than a D or E series.