I got this JD rider with a broken hood, I got some fiber glass stuff and patched it, it's not too pretty but as long as it holds that's fine with me. I'm sure no expert when it comes to this , so it looks pretty crude.
Yup, they made the hoods out of flimsy brittle plastic. Never a JD again. I've kept the machine in an enclosed shed all it's life so the sun does not have anything to do with it. All it's got is 500 hours of light exposure in actual use. I think that the plastic becomes more brittle with age. I've fixed mine a number of years ago with fiberglassing epoxy and fiberglass tape. Works very well but I continually have new cracks to repair in other spots. I guess once the hood is completely reinforced with fiberglass it will stop! Very slack of JD not to do better and address the problem especially for a machine that I paid a premium for. As for the seat, it too didn't last long before it cracked and came completely off the seat base. A tin of contact cement fixed that to some degree. The drag link for the steering separated right on one of the joints as well and I was shocked at how under engineered the actual joint was. A joint not much thicker than what you would use for a accelerator linkage! The insult then is that you have to go to JD and pay big money to replace a faulty part that shouldn't have failed with another under engineered part that also will fail in time. I made my own replacement by using tie-rod ends from a small car and fabricated a whole new assembly. Cost me $50 and a few hours but it's been absolutely flawless.
yes they are slacking in a lot of areas, that might be in design, so they can sell more parts, your idea of making your own steering parts is good, no doubt they are much stronger than those chintzy ones they use. A guy gave me a Cub Cadet that his grand daughter ran onto something with and broke the hood. He made a very good metal bumper for the front so I used that to secure the original hood to and so far it's working great,
The thing about fiber glass is it won’t stick to that plastic for every but it will hold for a while and over time will let go. Don’t know why John deer just didn’t make the hood out of steel and be done with it
I have replaced 3 john deere hoods on my lx 279.new hoods are very expensive. $369 plus labor. Vibration and raddling causes the plastic to break apart. It is frustrating.
MissouriOldTimer search on RU-vid “fix a cracked bumper fast and easy chris fix” I promise you won’t do this shit again! It was a good video and I completely get what you’re doing I was going to do the same thing myself. If you disagree I respect it... but at least check it out.
