(quoted from post at 07:31:55 09/18/19) Went to look at a guys 314 John Deere lawn tractor. He took out the kohler engine and installed a new Predator engine from harbor fright. He got it all hooked up and running. Now the problem, with the engine running when you turn on the pto it kills the engine. This is an electric clutch with no belt on at the moment. We bypassed all safety switches to eliminate any of them being bad. Still stops when the pto is engaged. So then we took another battery and ran the wires from the clutch to the extra battery. Same thing dies as soon as you turn it on. I?ve tried turning off the pto switch to see if the engine will return to run but it don?t, it just dies out. Are we having a magnetic field problem that is affecting something on the engine? Called the company but no help there.
If this is for REAL, and the engine dies when the electric clutch is energized, even by a spare battery, it would have to be that the magnetic field from the clutch coil is somehow stopping the electronic ignition from triggering.
Hey, let's confirm that by using a spark tester to verify that spark actually fails! (Also, does this have a electromagnetic fuel shutoff solenoid on the carb that may somehow affected?)
One other though, I think theses engines have ball bearings on the crankshaft, but is it possible there's crankshaft endplay that's affected by the clutch being energized that somehow messes up triggering of the ignition?
That being said, I have read MANY posts on the 'net where a Predator has been installed in a DEERE garden tractor, seems to be a VERY popular repower, and from those reports, they work well.
So what's going on, perhaps ignition system is not quite right/marginal and quits sparking to easily from an external magnetic influence?
I would check "air gap" between flywheel magnets and coil, perhaps a little less or a little more might make a difference?
As I understand you, you have tried powering the clutch coil by a totally separate spare battery.
If that is the case, and you are connecting direct to the clutch coil without ANY tractor wiring involved, just for giggles try reversing the polarity of the power to the clutch coil, battery (-) to the clutch coil lead and battery (+) to the chassis.
This will make the clutch "pull in" but produce a magnetic field of the opposite polarity. Does that affect the engine "dying"?