***"The half moon sector gear slip pass the teeth when you hear that rip sound. this caused the sector gear to not be center and you will have less or very little right or left steering wheel travel in the direction that the gear is short in."*** NO, the "rip" sound is when the PINION TEETH are "jumping over the teeth on the sector gear, not the other way around. Look at it this way. If you removed the sector gear from the tractor and left the steering wheel, steering column, and pinion gear in place......you would be able to sit there and spin the steering wheel in whichever direction you chose (CW or CCW), to the end of time (or til the economy turns around), without ever reaching a stopping point. It is the SECTOR GEAR that limits the number of revolutions you can turn the steering wheel from "lock to lock". What is happening with the "worn out" steering gears (and wear in the shaft bushing and wear in the sector gear pivot) where "you can turn more in a certain direction than the opposite direction" is because when you turn the steering in one direction.....the sector gear is PULLING on the drag link, and this increases the "separation space" or, "clearance between the pinion gear and the sector gear. With the extra clearance caused by turning in that direction, the pinion teeth will begin "jumping over" the teeth on the sector gear BEFORE the sector gear is able to rotate far enough for the front wheels to reach the limit of travel. BUT, when you turn the steering wheel in the opposite direction, the sector gear is PUSHING on the drag link. This has the effect of forcing the sector gear tighter against the pinion gear and thus, the pinion and sector gears remain in good mesh, and you can move the front wheels to the limit of travel when turing that direction ONLY. Trying to "center" or "index" the steering wheel does not help you make equally effective turns in either direction once the wear and slop reach the point of "jumping teeth". "Indexing" the steering wheel really only means that you have equal spacing of the spokes of the steering wheel on both sides of the clock (imagine the steering wheel is an analog clock face) when the front wheels are oriented "straight ahead". Indexing is not critical for operation of the steering system in executing turns. Indexing only becomes an issue where the position of a spoke might hide or conceal a dash gauge, indicator light or other important feature of the dash or instrument panel. If none of those details apply, it matters not the least where the steering wheel (and pinon gear are oriented). Driving a tractor typically involves so much turning of the steering wheel that you hardly roll more than a few feet before you need to turn the steering wheel one way or the other, so having the steering wheel properly indexed to the dash is not something that will keep the wheel positioned "in use", as you indexed it "while parked". Highway vehicles are almost the opposite (in regard to "centering the steering wheel") for a couple of reasons. First, the sector gears in the steering gearbox of those vehicles are made with "uneven size gear teeth". The teeth in the exact center of those sector gears, (or the center teeth of the "rack gear" in Rack & Pinion designs) are "slightly bigger" than the gear teeth on the rest of the sector gear (or rack gear in those types). The larger teeth in the center actually "bind mesh", or create an "interference fit" with the teeth of the pinion gear which reduces the clearance between pinion and sector (or rack) gears to ZERO. This "interference mesh" removes all slack or "free play" between the two gears and that means that you can "feel the road" with the steering wheel and the vehicle has a minimum amount of "hunting" caused by cumulative clearance in all the other components of the steering system. Why do they only make the center teeth "fit this tight" and not the entire sector (or rack) gear? Because, when you execute a "low speed turn" (like turning into a parking space etc.) it is desirable that the mesh be "looser" to make steering easier. Secondly, because of the greater "array" of instruments on the dash of highway vehicles, and the recent trend of having "steering wheel mounted functions or controls" (cruise control, entertainment sound systems, horn, to name just a few), it is "vital" that the steering wheel be indexed properly, so the steering wheel mounted features can be seen, and operated easily and accurately. The same constraints do not apply to your typical yard/garden tractor.

I just had a shop built (40 x 40 x 16' eaves) and am in the process of outfitting it. I had a separate 200 amp 220V service run. I have the plumbing in the slab for a sink, a shower, and a toilet. I will run the water through the walls when I can find the waterline to tie into. I need to get a sewerage ejector and lay drain line to get the plumbing to the septic system. I have a couple of steel crates that CNC machine lathes were shipped in from Japan. The tops will make chicken or pheasant coops for my wife. The bottoms are a lattice work of 5" steel channel. One will become a work bench (2 ft 8 in x 19 ft) for the grinders, drill presses, vice, etc. and a heavy work table (4 ft x 19 ft) on wheels for the chop saw and welding work. I plan to countersink the chop saw into the table to allow longer pieces to be cut easily. The other base (6 ft 8 in x 16 ft) is in limbo (maybe a heavy trailer). I plan to weld a 40 ft length of W12 x 16# I-beam to the overhead I-beams as a track for a 2 ton overhead hoist centered with a rollup door. There are plenty of outlets and overhead lights (2 used 8 ft fluorescents, free from work, they were being replaced and would have been scrapped) now in the future workbench area, with more to be added on the other side. Still to be added are overhead lights (at least 4 more 8 ft used fluorescents)(I was given 12 total). I have a welding maching receptacle in the front and back (near the workbench) of the shop and am currently building a wheeled cart for the welding machine and torch. I also plan to put in an electric heater for the work area. I plan to build storage shelves so I can empty my garage and park the car and truck in there (Isn't that a novel idea?). I also have an old refrigerator that my sister-in-law didn't have room for, so I am temporarily (mayber for years) housing it for them. The shop will house the tractor, riding lawn mower, and the popup camper, but should still have plenty of work space. I can get plenty of scrap steel pipe from work, but can only carry 10 footers in my truck. I need to borrow a trailer to carry longer ones (up to 20 ft or so) or have my company drop off the longest ones (up to 32 ft). So I have plenty of projects using pipe in the near future. Now if I could just finish the shop.

***"the "rack and pinion" so to speak, is centered, so I did not "skip" a tooth or two."*** That is NOT exactly a decisive way to tell whether a tooth has jumped, but usually, that works ok. The big gear is the SECTOR gear, so called because it is a "sector" of a circle. The small gear is the pinion, so, "sector and pinion" if you will. The best way to evaluate whether the pinion has jumped a tooth, or if something has become bent/twisted further "down stream", is to drive the tractor straight forward on a smooth, hard, preferably level (no side gradient) surface, taking careful notice of the "clock position" of the steering wheel. You can even mark the steering wheel with a small piece of masking tape and a corresponding piece of tape on a stationary surface if you don't trust the memory. With the steering wheel in the position you determined to be "straight forward travel", count the teeth on the sector gear and put a permanent mark on the sector gear center tooth. If the sector gear center tooth aligns with the center teeth/tooth of the pinion gear, the pinion gear has jumped maybe one tooth of the sector gear sometime during operation. You may have been making a hard turn when this occured and simply did not notice the click or bump that accompanies a tooth jump. But, if the center tooth of the sector gear lies to one or the other side of pinion gear center, you have bent something in the steering components further out toward the tires/wheels. Because the tires seek a "point of equilibrium" (regarding rolling resistance), bending or twisting a steering knuckle or spindle will change the "toe setting" between the left and right wheels. When the tires find the new point of equilibrium, the sector gear will be at a different orientation, and consequently...the clock position of the steering wheel will be off center as well. So, the first thing you need to do is determine whether a tooth has jumped, or not. If a tooth has jumped, do as rcmoser says and remove & re-index the steering wheel (which by BTW, your owners manual says to do also). The fact that Craftsman includes a small detail like that in the OM implies (to me) that this is actually a fairly common issue. Of course, on the factory end of the equation, this gives Craftsman a big lever to deny warranty claims for the off center wheel!!! They just say "you hit something, warranty does not cover that!". I'm being a bit pessimistic by including that in the post, but I've seen lots of "disclaimers" used by OEMs to deny warranty considerations, so I figure they might have out that in there for their own ulterior motives. If you find that the sector gear is actually centered where it should be, you might want to look very carefully at everything about your steering links, spindles, axle and mounts before changing the steering wheel orientation.

Fill the tank. Check the mileage reading on the odometer. Run it till it's about out. Fill tank again. Subtract previous mileage reading from current one. Divide that by how many gallons you put in the car. Then post that number. Your 15 gallon tank and car wasting gas discriptions are meaningless. If it's leaking fuel, you'll smell it even if it's just a little. If you don't feel a misfire, the plugs and wires are doing their jobs so leave them alone. If it's burning gas as fast as you suspect it is, there ought to be visible emmissions...cloud of black smoke following you around. If you're going by what the gas guage says without checking, the problem could just be the gas guage. I've seen them read full for 200 miles then drop quickly to 1/4 tank, or drop quickly from full and stay at a quarter tank. If you're going to try to figure this kind of thing out on your own, you got to at least do the math for starters.