Lawnmower Repair

Mark and I set out on an unsuccessful mission to fix my lawnmower on Saturday. The machine was well-worked over. The Gas tank, carburator, head, spark plug, air filter, primer button, flywheel, engine cover, etc... It was bare bones. We repalced almost all those parts, and then fired it up, well we tried. Pulled so hard my arm grew a couple inches. NOTHING!

Well after hours of time wasted playing with the lawnmower the mystery is solved. I took it to a repair shop. The guy was really nice, he let me work in his shop, I removed all the parts. And then he helped me figure out the rest.

The acronym FAST is used for small-engine repair. Fuel, Air, Spark, Timing in that order. Well after getting to the spark, a spark tester confirmed that it was working. So the only thing left was the timing. Turns out the soft metal key used to attach the flywheel in the correct location was sheared. Thus the spark was being sent when the engine was not ready.

I will now have to wait and see how long the mower works. It's running pretty good right now. I'm thinking the timing has been off for a while. The mower is pretty much alive now.

Drafted by: Brian