Noma B3812-130 vs Cub Cadet 1650?

Hey all,

I currently have the above-mentioned Noma (now Murray), which I got for free from a church. It has a 12HP Briggs and a 38" dual-blade belly deck. The engine runs well, but the rack-and-pinion steering is sloppy, and the drive slips in 4th and 5th. Okay, not so bad, I just mow slowly and steer carefully!

This spring, I fired it up and set to mowing the lawn. Halfway through my first row, the deck set to rumbling, then growling, and before I could shut it off, started banging. Long story short, the upper bearing on one of the two mower quills blew out, the balls of which bound up and cracked the quill housing, which then pitched the blade into the deck.

The quill housing is cast aluminum, but no one around here will TIG weld it because the bearing damage may have cracked it elsewhere. I tried ordering just the housing from Murray, but they only sell the quills as complete assemblies, from pulley to blade carrier. $130 later, one"s on its way to me right now, just to get the lawn done.

A friend of mine is willing to sell me his IH Cub Cadet 1650 for $800. It"s got a 42" deck with new blades, and it runs, but the engine shakes (he"s got new mounts for it, hopefully that"ll fix it but we don"t know) and it uses oil inside and out (bad rings, bad seals). It has no PTO, and I don"t know a) if I need one, and b) what it"d take to put one on. I"d mostly just use it for mowing in the summer and plowing snow in the winter.

Does this sound like a good deal? $800 seems awful high to me, but checking the recent sale prices here, working Cadets of various models go anywhere from $250 on up to $1200. What"s fair? Is a smoke-blowing, shaking Cadet better than a good-running Murray with two bad speeds?

TIA,
Nick

Anything is better than a Murray.

get the cub. once you fix what's wrong, you will have 5 times the machine that noma ever dreamed of being. not to mention that it might just last you 20 more years as opposed to the noma which might last you another.... how many years? nowhere near as many as that cub will! just my two cents.

If it has a 42" deck that is working it has a PTO. The PTO is a front mounted electric PTO.
That model is infamous for shaking. There are up-dated modifications that help. Info can be found on the cub cadet sites.
I would take the 1650 .

It's pretty easy move up from a Murry.

That being said I think $800 is to much for that 1650. The 1650 is a great machine, don't get me wrong but you could have hundreds of dollars into it after the initial $800 before you even start mowing.


The 16hp Kohler is a tough engine but not the smoothest ever made. I had a 169, that sucker would mow wit the best of them, your feet would tingle after a couple of hours though.

If it was me I would look for one ready to mow or try to get the 1650 for less.

K

$800 is too much for a 1650 if it needs an overhaul unless it has front hydraulic ports. C.C. thought they didn't need balance gears in the engine when they decided to use rubber mounts. What usually happens is the 2 rails that the engine bolts to loosen up and it can ruin the oil pan on the engine. I have a 1450 that had the same problem. I tied the 2 rails together to make more of a cradle, then tack welded the bolts once they were tight. I used rubber shock absorber grommets in place of the factory mounts. Not quite as smooth as original, but 15 years later, I haven't had the engine come loose in the frame.
When it comes to balance gears, some of the guys on the Cub Cadet sites refer to them as "Grenade Gears". Supposedly the gears have been responsible for some catastrophic engine failures. I've never seen it or know anybody who did have it happen. My Kohlers all have balance gears except the 1450.
Once you use something like that older Cub, Case, JD, Wheel Horse, you will realize that Murray mower is not worth spending money on.

I tried to send up a reply yesterday, but we had some horrendous powerful storms here in MO last night, and it knocked our satellite out of whack. Hopefully it'll stay in long enough for me to send this up.

Thanks for the replies, particularly Kopeck and Brian. What I didn't fully articulate was that I wasn't so concerned with whether the CC was better than the Murray; that much has already been shown through the years.

What I really wanted to know, was 'is $800 too much for a CC IN THAT CONDITION,' and 'is a CC IN THAT CONDITION (smoking, leaking oil inside and out, shaking) still better than a Murray that, apart from the recent mower damage and a slipping rear end, is working just fine?' Thank you for verifying my gut feeling that he's asking too much.

I did not note hydro ports at the front of the engine, but I may be able to get back to it in the next day or two. I did not see any sort of PTO output front or rear, electric or otherwise. In the front, all I can see is oil-soaked belts on pulleys; in the back, there's the cover plate over the rear axle with the fill/check port (the set screw with the 3/8" square drive hole in it).

It's a bit dinged up, but not nearly as rusty as some I've seen. He says he has the engine side shields for it "somewhere", but to tell the truth, I don't care; I don't need a concourse winner, I need a worker. There's a pedal or something missing from whatever the lever is on the right side by your foot.

The owner says it runs, with the requisite shaking and smoking and dripping, but he just puts a quart in every so often and keeps his eye on it. He also says it has new blades under the deck, but I haven't looked to verify it. He says he mowed with it recently, but needed the coil for another tractor (his 105), since he can mow with that one without having his teeth fall out.

Would it be insulting to offer the guy $3-400 for it? This is, of course, in the consideration that I'd need to fix the engine mounts and rebuild the engine in the not-too-distant future. The smoking sounds like just bad rings and potentially valves (I'd do em at the same time just because) and new seals where the engine leaks. What else? What's a good price to go up to if he doesn't come down so far?

The PTO is looks like a belt pulley. It sits on the front of the engine and then uses a long belt through the "mule gear" (two pulleys that twist the belt to send the 90 deg.) to power the deck.

There should be a switch in the dash that turns it on. Might be you just didn't see it, it doesn't really stick out all that much and I think everything's painted black engine wise on those machines so it probably blended in.

$400 sounds OK. Rebuilding the engine isn't hard if you're handy. I would make sure the PTO is there and works then go from there. When I rebuilt my 169's engine I left the balance gears out as I had heard as well they were a ticking time bomb. It didn't shake anymore or any less.

Gunk on the read end is pretty common. If you have a pressure washer it will make quick work of it. I would probably change the fluid in the rear end too. It one of those things that not many people do.

K

Kopeck,

Thanks for the reply. I did see a pulley with belts from the front of the engine, I didn't realize it was a PTO, thought it was just another belt-driven something-or-other. I'll make sure that's what it is tomorrow.