Cheetah no start - bad relay under key switch panel

My Cheetah is 3 years old and has 140 hours on it now. I am happy with it.

However, I have replaced the key switch, battery, and this week the start relay with diode went out. All of these issues caused a sometimes no crank condition. That gets old fast. Should I have to replace anything on a commercial mower with just 140 hours?

I am learning how to work on a Scag but I really don't care to. My dealer is too busy and it is a hassle to haul the mower. I hope I am through working on my mower for a while. I talked my son into purchasing a Tiger Cat this year, I hope he doesn't have any issues.

Here is what happened this week. I turned the key and again no crank. I used a previous post on this site to test my electronic module. All OHSA switches were sending power to the module. So I made a jumper wire to fool the seat switch and allow me to investigate with the seat up. I used a pair of vice grips on the key and wedged the vice grips to hold the key in the start position. Then I proceeded to pull/twist/shake/probe all wiring connections and stick my test light into connections. While touching a wire in the start relay the starter motor turned over. I replaced that relay with an old $2 one that I had in a parts drawer. The starter turned over and the engine came to life.

I looked up the part number and learned the Scag relay (from China I think) costs about $30. I learned it had a diode in the relay to protect electrical components. So I took off my old relay and ordered a new one.

I posted this info in hopes that it may help someone down the line. The previous post on how to troubleshoot the power module helped me. Just trying to pay it forward. Cheers.

First thing is always check ground. Hook a test light to ground then probe on the scag harness side of module after the connection. Turn key on then probe orange,light blue,brown pink should have a light but while doing each wire move handles both light should go out. Same for the other colors I named. Almost would say it will be the pto light blue that will fail causing the no start. Can only test when there is a no start present. Hard to fix if it isn't broken.