Lots of rain and soggy ground around here lately.
The last 2 days have been dry, so my wife and I decided to mow. I own another property about 3 or so miles away and that needed mowing.
I hitched my utility trailer to my truck and went to load my zero turn onto it.
I just used that mower last week to my here at my house for about 45 minutes.
My other property has 3.5 acres of ground to mow, less the 42x60' pole barn.
Well my mower would turn over, but not fire.
It is 8 y.o. and has a Cat 28hp diesel engine.
I suspect the pre-heater, but do not know.
No, problem, I decided to drive my compact utility tractor out there. I have had it my house all winter to plow or scoop snow with.
I drove it about half a mile before I noticed it losing power. I looked at the Temp gauge and it was almost peaked out. It too has a diesel, close to the same HP. Well after adding some anti freeze, I was back on the road, but still the power seems low. I have a front end loader on it. I usually remove the bucket before I mow and it had the rear plow on it too. I took that off to hook up the mower deck.
It took a long time to mow that today. I was not able to get my zero turn to fire when I got home either. Getting onto a trailer with no power is tough. I wish I would have loaded it before I took my tractor over now.

Momma said there would be days like this....

Yeah, momma said.

I guess it was a worse day than I thought.

I took my zero turn in. They called and said it was a fuel solenoid. They said that solenoid was $100. I said ok, sounds like a lot for a solenoid, but what ya gonna do? I had also told them to change the Hydraulic oil while it was there.
That has 2 filters on the Hydraulic.
I looked up the fuel solenoid online and the ones I found were over $225.
Well, I picked it up today and it cost $660.
OUCH!
I objected and the guy said well we told you the hydraulic oil was $10/qt. I said yeah times 4=$40. He said no, that takes 8 qts. I said, when I changed it the last time, you can only drain 4 qts out. So, he calls the tech in and he says yeah, but we had to order a case of that oil and the books says it takes 8 qts so you have to pay for 8, the other 4 are on your mower. Ok, but $660?
It is a good thing I did not ask them to change the engine oil too. Yeah the 2 hyd. filters were $25 each, but man. The oil was pure synthetic too.
I have less than 300 hrs on it and the solenoid went bad, the main drive belt broke and wiped out a pulley and the main ground cable. One of the 3 mower deck spindles went bad. I have the duct tape the wheel spindle caps on, because a good stiff breeze will blow them off.
I have 2 fuel tanks and if I fill either more than half full fuel bubbles out of the fuel cap vent holes.
Other than that it has been great! This is the only time it has failed to start.
But gee, I have a diesel tractor, the fuel solenoid has never failed on it. It is a 1990 or 91 model with 1100 hrs. The mower deck on that has never had a spindle fail, they have manual grease zirks. the zero turn deck has not grease zirks.
The tractor has had very few problems. I think I have had it in twice and never a $500 plus bill, I now have 2 of those in less than 300 hrs.


I

The rain left here yesterday,today is a beautiful day.

What brand is the zero turn?

Some pretty lame excuses from your dealer, I'd be looking for options.

Yep, Paul, No, other Bad Boy diesel dealers around here, but will definitely take to another tractor service dealer who has a diesel technician.

I have a dealer who has done some things with my compact diesel tractor.
I have spent more money on this zero turn with less than 300 hours on it, than my compact tractor with 1000 hours on it.
Oh, my sump pump went out on me the other day too, that thing was only 6 months old.0

From what I saw when I was painstakingly searching for a ZTR, BadBoy puts big motors on light duty frames/hardware.
They look good on specs & price point, but I could really tell a difference between them & Scag/JD/Hustler, etc.

You didn't by chance get some bad fuel did you?