u/BishopRealTalk

This is a bit of a weird one, and I know nothing about injection molding so please be patient with me.

Theres some weird people out there like myself who like to keep old garden tractors alive. For reasons I won’t get into here, they don’t make em like they used to.

My particular generation, the Cub Cadet Cyclops has an Achilles heel, and that’s the hood, nose, and side panels. They’re made of ABS plastic and they break very easily. These tractors are about 30 years old.

Is it possible to economically make replacements? There’s so many of us out here riding around with destroyed plastics but otherwise good tractors. The factory that made them burned down and the molds were destroyed. We tried to buy them to remake them.

If injection molding isn’t feasible, can someone point me in the right direction?

This is a bit of a weird one, and I know nothing about 3d printing so please be patient with me.

Theres some weird people out there like myself who like to keep old garden tractors alive. For reasons I won’t get into here, they don’t make em like they used to.

My particular generation, the Cub Cadet Cyclops has an Achilles heel, and that’s the hood, nose, and side panels. They’re made of ABS plastic and they break very easily. These tractors are about 30 years old.

Is it possible to 3d print replacements? There’s so many of us out here riding around with destroyed plastics but otherwise good tractors. The factory that made them burned down and the molds were destroyed. We tried to buy them to remake them.

If 3d printing isn’t feasible, can someone point me in the right direction?

I bought this 2182 as my primary mower a couple of years ago. It came with the service manual, and a couple of spare parts.

I am thoroughly upset that you basically can’t buy a new true garden tractor anymore, so I’m going to completely disassemble this and strip the frame to bare metal. I’m not sure how long it’ll take since many of the parts are hard to find. I already bought some side panels in phenomenal shape, but I know some of the rest will be difficult.

We used to have a proper country, and I intend to keep as much of it alive as I can. I’ll be adding the 3 point hitch during this as well. While I’ll probably strip and repaint the deck, I’m probably going to retire this from mowing. The 60” deck is just too big for my current yard.

Has anyone here restored a cyclops before?