Cub Cadet Drive System Plus?

[JTK]

I was hoping one of you oil guru’s could help me figure out a suitable aftermarket transaxle oil for my new Cub Cadet garden tractor (2544 model). It has a hydro-gear hydrostatic drive bolted to a cast iron differential. I know hydo-gear typically specs motor oil in the 50wt range, but of course Cub only ‘recommends’ the use of their own “Drive System Plus” hydrostat oil. It’s a synthetic blend that appears to be just a heavier motor oil at a cost of about $8/qt! The trans takes 6qts! I did a bunch of research and found that Shell/Equilon makes the oil for CC. I emailed Shell & they were nice enough to send me a copy of the product data sheet for this oil (great people to deal with BTW). Thing is, I’m not versed enough to match this oil up with something off the shelf?!? Here’s the data:

Typical Characteristics

Shell TTF-SB
Code No. 53058
Appearance = clear pale
Gavity, API= 28.4 test method= D 1298
Flash, COC, degF= 435 test method = D 92
Pour Point, degF= -15 test method = D 97
Viscosity
cSt @ 40degC= 102 test method = D 445
cSt @ 100degC 13.5 test method = D 445
Viscosity Index= 132 test method = D 2270
Sulf Ash, wt%= 1.2 test method = D 874

Thanks!
Joel

 

[JTK]

Still coming up dry on this one. If need be, a HDEO in the 40-50wt range, preferably syth or syth blend should do the trick. It's a good thing cub cadet only specs a trans filter change every 100hrs and a full trans oil swap every 400hrs. I only do about 40hrs/yr!

Joel