I have the 217 with blade brake and hydrostatic drive. The other day I hit a post pretty hard and didn't notice anything immediately, but on the next lawn a week later it seemed to be struggling a bit in the thicker grass, and cutting the grass instead of mulching. I thought the revs had dropped a bit, but had nothing to confirm this as had no tachometer. I know it was running around 3200 under load when on full throttle before a cheap tach I had died. I got another cheap one but I don't really trust it, I did a governor adjustment that increased it a bit but now there is a noticeable large increase in revs when the blades are disengaged. I have to start it and idle it at about half throttle, engage blades then increase to full throttle. Then when the mowing is done and I disengage blades revs increase drastically.
What should I check to see if hitting the post did some damage, and do the the symptoms sound consistent with hitting something, or should I be checking somewhere else?
Mower is pretty new, probably done around 20 hours.
