Plastic cover removed from motor. No clip on the gear, the cover is what keeps it in place.
Plastic tensioning wheels, the MTD had steel and two drive belts on the auger.
The bolt holding these 2 pulleys in place became lose on my machine after 2 hours use. The drive belt then came off rendering F/R unuseable. I would guess it was not tightened down properly at the factory. I used a large wrench to hold the HEX between the pulleys and another smaller wrench to tighten the bolt down and re-installed the belts. Works now.