JD 314 Garden Tractor Value

IMO as long as its not smoking, the 700 should be fine. If this is your first older JD, congratulations. I've owned the 1980's JD models for many years. They are built like tanks. As said before, if you don't have a problem fixing your own equipment its hard to go wrong with such a popular series of tractor.

KenLockett said:

Problem is when I have the front and rear wheels adjusted at say the position for 2" the front wheels are much lower to the ground than the rear wheels. I think I need to first adjust what I think are called the draft rods attached to the front of the deck to lift the nose of the deck to better level. These are like threaded rods. I believe this as when I lowner the deck the front wheels hit first then settles a bit before rear wheels hit. Lastly trying to figure out the height adjustment knob and wing piece up top for 'height adjustment, I believe this piece acts like a height 'stop' when lowering deck but hard to see how it functions and not sure if I should tighten the wing against knob or against sleeve over threaded rod.

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Not quite the same tractor, but I just went through levelling my JD LA135 last weekend, and it sounds like the basics are the same.

Make sure tire pressures are OK.

Park on level surface & set the cutting height to what you usually mow at, measure & set the side to side first. I measured to the very bottom edge of the cutting deck, at each rear corner. Should be about 1/2" less that what height lever says - but that figure is not quite as important as getting each rear corner the same. Adjust the nuts under the rod sleeve to set. (That's likely where there might be some difference in mechanisms over the years).

Once you get it right side to side, check the front middle edge & set it so it's about 1/4" lower than the rear corners, using what sounds like your front draft rods. Mine only has one in the middle - sounds like yours has two?

Then, once you get the deck right, you can adjust the wheels by moving the wheel bolts up or down so the wheels are about 1/2" off the ground at cutting height. (Of course, if they're hitting the ground when you do the levelling above, you'll need to first raise them or take them off so the deck isn't resting on them).

My manual said to measure to the bottom outside tips of the blades for all this, but after checking, it was easier to measure to the bottom of the deck, and each blade had the same height difference to bottom of deck.

This was the first time I had gone through this with mine, I had just been using it the way it came from the dealer 5 or 6 years ago. My wheels were way out of adjustment for the height I mow at (I mow tall, they were set for short), it was tipped to one side, and it was way high on the front. So was cutting grass twice, back & front, with each pass. Seems much better now after one mowing.

Most important thing I found in that exercise, before I did all that, was remove the deck & get rid of the buildup underneath (I was amazed how much dead grass was stuck under there, the blades were pretty well up against it), wire wheel the bejeebers out of the underside (remove blades - I used a grinder with a big wire wheel), and re-paint. Mine was starting to rust, kinda bad for the age I thought. Funny how a little job like levelling a deck can snowball into other stuff...

KenLockett said:

YES Does not like to start when hot. Starts fine when cold. This is not going to work for me. Very frustrating if you have to shut engine down when mowing and can't restart. Did you ever try to make adjustment to correct this? Carb adjustment maybe? Anyone else have any ideas or thoughts?

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While it is finicky when hot it, mine never fails to start when hot. Just takes a little throttle and choke action.
Let me know if you find anything.

KenLockett said:

So when hot do you start will full throttle and you do use full choke or partial?

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It's so second nature after all of these years. I'd have to do it and pay attention next time. I've only had to mow once in the past month due to the dry weather. With 90s and no rain for another week it doesn't look like much mowing for the rest of the summer.
Hang in there. You'll get it figured out.
Given what you found with the deck setup it won't be surprising if it needs a good carb cleaning.

Surveyor said:

While it is finicky when hot it, mine never fails to start when hot. Just takes a little throttle and choke action.
Let me know if you find anything.

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Make sure the cooling fins on the head and block are clean and not plugged with grass. Also check the fuel lines, air cooled motors can vapor lock if they get too close to hot surfaces since most early ones don't use fuel pumps.

Go to Weekendfreedommachines.com to identify any problems you may have. People there know your machine like the back of their hands.

Running a tank (or two) of fuel through it with some Seafoam added might work wonders. It has for me before.