Hi CaptainCranky, welcome to Outdoorking. I think you'll find a lot of members here have mowers as old as yours, and tend to keep them working as long as they can, partly because it saves money and partly because they enjoy the challenge.

Your Victa 11-497 seems to be actually an MTD 132-497-612. Neither Victa nor Rover actually made ride-on mowers - they both applied their brands to imported American machines. If you can find an MTD model and serial sticker, it may be possible to get access to an owner manual. The sticker should look like this example from the MTD website:
[Linked Image]

The problem I have at the moment is that I do not know which clutch you are having trouble with: the one for the wheel-drive, or the one for the cutter-deck drive.

Here is the Illustrated Parts List diagram for the wheel drive:
[Linked Image]

Here is the IPL diagram for the cutter drive:
[Linked Image]

I suggest you work from these diagrams to identify where your problem is, and tell us about it by referring to the numbers given on those diagrams.

[Rover, of course, did design and make their own ride-ons. ed: CyberJack]

Last edited by CyberJack; 15/12/15 11:15 PM. Reason: Updated information.