DF's Lawn Mower Repair Thread

[Intrepidation]

Those are all past mowers, let's move on to current events!

 

Today's projects were a Yard Man that, after replacing the recoil I found to be very hard to pull over and a Craftsman I picked up yesterday.

 

Initially I thought the flywheel key was ok on the Yard Man, but I looked at its flywheel again and compared it to a parts Tecumseh with the same key design.

The Yard Man:



The other engine:



Its not a lot, but its definitely off. Perhaps enough to throw the timing off, and this is why its so hard to pull? I'm going to get a new key for it and replace it. Certainly can't hurt to dry.

With nothing left to do with the Yard Man for now,I decided to tackle the Craftsman I picked up. Sorry no before pictures, but the rundown is this: recoil spring broken, no gas in tank but I could smell bad gas, covered in leaves.

Things got off to a bad start when I replaced the recoil with the one from the silver Craftsman I recently scrapped. The recoil itself went on fine, and this mower has the same handlebar design, so there was a hole in the middle of the handlebar for the bracket.

However it quickly went downhill when I pulled the spark plug out and gave it a pull. It burped out a nasty brown liquid that I couldn't tell was gas or water. When I removed the muffler and the carburetor, some of the same liquid came out.

I was afraid this was going to be a junk engine, but it spun freely so I decided to proceed anyway. The tank was empty, but the carburetor has...something...still in it.



It smelled aweful! this gas was really old.

Wanted to quickly see if this would even run, I yanked the carburetor I had just cleaned up yesterday for the Yard Man and put it on the Craftsman. Hooked it all up, replaced the plug, checked the oil, which actually wasn't bad at all, and prepared for the moment of truth. To my surprise, in two pulls it was running and running really well! I had expected smoke or something to come out of the exhaust but not smoke to be seen. Somehow this engine runs perfectly, and the drive system works too! That made my evening. I'll need to sharpen the blade and change the oil, but this one's a runner. Cosmetically, the paint is bubbling around the belt cover and there's some surface rust, but its solid overall. When its all done it'll list for less than the Rally.

Here it is washed off an back together. I'll do what I can with the existing paint later, but its not being repainted.





With it in good running order, I decided to keep the borrowed carburetor on it, and put its on the Yard Man.

While I deemed the bowl and float a loss, I got lucky in that there wasn't much fuel in the bowl, so there was only some green staining on the bottom of carburetor itself. I wire brushed it and the jet off, cleaned it really good, and replaced the missing primer bulb.







It could almost pass for new now!

[Robert Hall]

This is a fun thread, good to see it updated.  I've never had a mower of my own, but growing up I used to help my folks mow the acreage at the country place in Ohio (we've always called it the farm, but we weren't farming anything) and helping my Dad maintain the mowers..we had 4 Snapper Comet riding mowers, a '70, '76, '80, and an '86 vintage IIRC....the older ones were Briggs & Stratton, the later Tecumseh powered and they had more problems...finicky carbys IIRC.

[ccap41]

Awesome updates! Keep'm coming..and I'll keep enjoying them! 

[daves87rs]

I'm sure one will pop up.....

 

Granted, I wish it would stop raining here...glass is growing like crazy...up a bit after just a few days. My mower gets pissed if it gets too high....have it up as high as it goes, and it might choke a bit on the grass in the back......

[ocnblu]

Dodgefan, you've gotta see this:

 

[G. David Felt]

Dodgefan, you've gotta see this:

 

12805778_1314407368585882_3900602976884146028_n.jpg

+1

[Intrepidation]

Dodgefan, you've gotta see this:

 

12805778_1314407368585882_3900602976884146028_n.jpg

 

Camino showed me that, it's quite the machine!

[daves87rs]

Very cool!

[Guest Workingman]

I have an Ariens LM219SP model 911045 serial 004096 it has a briggs and stratton 5hp engine.  I might sell I am in Missouri.