One thing that is a beautiful looking cat you have there! Been over on those prices, I wouldn't want to pay that much either. That shaft can be fixed. My zero turn mower had about the same problem with it under the PTO. The dealer i took it to said i have 2 options, one was to replace the crankshaft or he could put in a fix but I can only run the mower at full throttle. I chose put the metal in. If that goes out then I will have him put new crankshaft in. The mower cost over ten thousand dollars. I hit barb wire and it wrapped around the blades. It all came out easy but did a lot of damage.
Thanks for the comment! Your mower is definitely worth spending time and money on. The owner of this Toro blower wasn't interested in spending any money on it. We don't really have an interest in repairing it either - so to the snowblower graveyard it went.
Just take the shaft to a machine shop, and have them build the shaft back up and recut a new keyway - it certainly won't cost as much as the replacement.
