RM48 and AHRM48 mulching blades

[DavidBarkey]

I tried drilling out the blade center hole on a small drill press at work. The blades appear to be hardened steel and I wasn't able to make much progress I'm also not able to hold the blades in a vice very well due to both sides being sharpened

I did come across some cool blade adapters called X-Blades. Basically its a blade adapter that allows you to mount a second blade at 90° to the first blade on the same spindle. Seems to be for commercial use only... I'm not sure my 16HP vanguard engine would do very well running a 48" mowing deck with 6 blades.

Matt , you will need to lock in a vise and use a carbide end mill . To do this you need a really good drill press or a mill so to keep it from chattering or walking . The steel will be hardened and tempered like spring steel .

Dave

[Timj]

@MattA thought I would throw this over here from some of the discussion on Propane57 s thread on stepped increasing blade speed.

I got off track, kinda, on something I'm working on and was looking for some numbers for comparison. Thought it was interesting.

Have you ever checked the actual rpms of your deck? Sorta a see if the math=the real world.

3600rpm 5" pulley driving 4.25" pulley= 4235rpm

3.1417 x 17 x 4235 ÷12= 18,849fpm blade tip speed.

Assuming you're engine is making 3600rpm.
Assuming I did the math right.

If you smelled/saw smoke it was just my gears turning and belts slipping.

Tim

[MattA]

Tim - Your math is correct. I got about the same number for blade tip speed. I picked up about +15% more blade tip speed by swapping from the RM48 center spindle pulley to the RM38.
I have not checked my decks rpms but I do have a tach for engine rpms. With the hydravac and RM48 deck running the engine speed is typically in the 3400 to 3500rpm range. With deep grass or the hill in ny front yard, I'm down to a slow crawl to keep the rpms up. In these situations I can easily overwhelm the engine and quickly drop the rpms to 3200 or less. Getting the rpms back up requires me to pretty much stop or Crest the small hill.
Without the hydravac running, just my RM48 deck, Rpms at no load can peak 3600+. Deep grass and the hill are much less of a problem. Tractor actually feels like it has some power. I can still overwhelm the engine.
It's probably a good thing Ingersoll dropped the 4016 vanguard. Ingersoll actually made a 4014 Kohler early on.

[MattA]

Bob Mac's RM deck pulley size comparison.

[Timj]

Thanks Matt, I had used alot of Bob's info for this. This gives me a good baseline for comparison on my AHRM. When I get it on I am going to check the RPMs with an optical tach. Going to try to get it on tomorrow, suppose to be warm this week, grass may be ready to mow in a week.
Tim

[MattA]

I've been doing some more research on mulching blades for out tractors. Figured I'd post some of the search results...
Megmo and Cutlass make custom mulching blade solutions. Both solutions cost $250ish-$300ish and have four replaceable pivoting blades.
https://meg-mo.com/
https://cutlassblades.com/

[MattA]

I've also been doing some research on other brand mulching blades and using a custom blade adapter. The green tractor brand uses a 7 point star drive and has 17" and 17 1/16" mulching blades. I'm thinking of having a custom Ingersoll spindle shaft to blade drive adapter made to work with these blades. The blades may have a slightly different offset which could be accounted for in the blade drive adapter length (if needed).

Stens 17" 7 point star standard mulching blades:
https://www.stens.com/330-318-mulching-blade
https://www.stens.com/330-445-hi-lift-blade
Toothed or gator mulching blade
https://www.stens.com/362-440-toothed-blade

Oregon 17" 7 point star standard mulching blades:
https://www.oregonproducts.com/en/mulch ... 2/p/92-105
https://www.oregonproducts.com/en/orego ... /p/192-104
https://www.oregonproducts.com/en/mower ... 2/p/91-586

Oregon 91-586 and Stens 362-440 seem like the best candidates so far based on the same blade length (17") and width (2.5") as the Ingersoll blades.

Standard non-mulching blade Ingersoll C31572 (Oregon 91-117) (Stens 310-366)
Size: Length: 17"
Center Hole: 7/8" H, 1-1/4" W
Width: 2.50"
Thickness: 0.187"
Offset: 1/2"
Air Lift: 1"

Oregon also no longer lists 91-117 on there website. Stens still lists 310-366.

[Timj]

@MattA were you still looking for a mulching kit? I ran across this, no blades.
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/it ... tid=dXMIcH

[MattA]

@MattA were you still looking for a mulching kit? I ran across this, no blades.
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/it ... tid=dXMIcH

Thanks Tim. That's a price I'd be willing to pay.

[MattA]

@MattA were you still looking for a mulching kit? I ran across this, no blades.
https://www.facebook.com/marketplace/it ... tid=dXMIcH

Thanks Tim. That's a price I'd be willing to pay.

Does anybody know this seller? Seems to have a lot of Case Ingersoll equipment forsale.