Now that the fall rush to plant cold weather grasses is ending, it’s a good time to look over your Billy Goat power rake or overseeder and make sure it’s ready for the spring. This guide will walk you through inspecting and replacing the belts and reels on your equipment.
Maintenance Schedule and Access
Every 25 hours of operation, the reel bearings should be greased and the reel blades and all belts should be inspected. Belts should be replaced when they show signs of cracking or stretch to a point that they can’t be engaged by the clutch.
To access these components, tilt the rake back onto its handle or prop it up on blocks. If the blades are going to be rotated or replaced, the reel height should be at its lowest setting.
Reels
The minimum length for a flail blade is three inches on the CR550HC and 3.25 inches on the PR550, while minimum length on all slicing blades is three inches. If any blade is under this length, all blades should be replaced. Billy Goat recommends replacing the flail shafts and flails at the same time. Blades that are cracked or bent should be replaced immediately and can be done individually.
Flail blades have two cutting surfaces and can be flipped to spread out wear. This can be done using a pair of ½ inch socket wrenches:
1. Remove the 6 lock nuts holding the belt and shaft guards in place, then remove the guards.
2. Slide the drive belt off of the reel pulley.
3. Remove the four lock nuts and washers holding the bearings to the frame. The reel can now be removed from the rake.
4. Remove the capscrew, lockwasher, reel pulley, key and finally the spacer from the end of the reel.
5. Rotate the reel end to end, and re-install the items removed in step 4.
6. Re-install the reel, belt, and guards in the reverse order of removal.
Drive Belt Replacement (All Models)
1. Remove the screws holding the belt guard in place. Slide the guard off of the rake.
2. Pull the old belt off of the drive pulley and remove it from the rake. Slide the new belt onto the pulleys in its place.
3. Engage the bail and check the length of the idler spring: on the CR550HC, it should stretch between 1 and 1 ¼ inches. On other models, the idler pulley just needs to put tension on the cable. Adjust the clutch cable so that it falls within this range.
4. Reinstall the belt guard.
Jackshaft and Mule Belt Replacement (OS 500)
1. Place the overseeder on blocks and remove the rear right tire and the spring holding the housing to the frame.
2. Remove the screws holding on the belt guard, followed by the four screws holding the mule drive in place beneath the guard.
3. Slide the mule belt off of the pulley.
At this point, the old mule belt can be removed and replaced with a new belt. If you’re replacing the jackshaft belt, do the following:
4. Remove the mule assembly, leaving the mule belt on the transmission.
5. Remove the carriage bolt and nuts holding the right-side bearing on the jackshaft, leaving the bearing and pulley in place.
6. Unscrew and remove the jackshaft belt guard.
7. Slide the old belt off of the crankshaft pulley, then down the jackshaft and over the mule pulley. Slide on the new belt.
8. Reattach the mule drive and belt. Check the idler tension on the belt when the drive lever is engaged. If it’s too loose, the spring holding the idler arm should be replaced.
9. Reassemble the overseeder.
Getting Parts for Your Overseeder
If you need new blades, belts or anything else for your Billy Goat, you can find it at www.billygoatparts.com. We’re not just an online parts warehouse, we’re a certified dealer, which lets us offer the full line of Billy Goat factory parts. We even have their factory diagrams built into our search system so you can locate the exact part you need on your equipment. We ship across the U.S. and Canada.
