We have a 1360, steel-on-steel. The driveline holds up very well, with the following caveats:

1. The overrunning slip clutch in the driveline: make sure this is adjusted properly. Too loose on the pressure plate adjustment and it will burn up when you get into a heavy crop. Too tight and you will rip the belts in the header up when it needs to slip.

2. There is a sealed bearing in the idler pulley for the main drive belt. You have to remove the top shield on the left side (as you stand behind the header, looking forward) of the header to access the main drive belt and the idler. This stupid, stupid "sealed" bearing can and will seize up on you. When it does, a $10 sealed bearing destroys a $120 drive belt. I recommend you check this bearing at the start of every season and try to get some sort of lube in there. Make sure after you are done cutting you blow any shatter out from under this shield. I keep a new idler pulley (with the sealed bearing in the middle of it) on hand to change out, should I notice that there is any drag on that idler. Last time I checked, the cost was about $28 for the idler.

Insert my standard rant on sealed bearings here.

3. Do not scrimp on the gearlube in the driveline gearboxes. These won't get as hot on your 12' wide cutterbed as on the 15' cutterbed, but they do get warm - real warm - on a hot summer day, trapped under those shields, with no airflow to cool them off.

The only other issue is that the pull-behind mower/conditioners are harder to clean out than the self-propelled jobs. This is due to the belts, gearboxes, etc that transfer the power from the driveline to the cutterbed.

I believe the 40->45 (as well as 60->65) transition happened in 2002. One of the best features on the "xxx5" machines was the addition of an oil level indication for the cutterbed. On the 1340/1360, the only way to know how much lube you have in the cutterbed is to drain it completely and re-fill it with the proper amount of lube.