Consumer Grade Self-Propelled Mower Life Expectancy -- (MTBF)

Just some quick comments for those of you wondering how long your shiny new mower is going to be with you on this planet.

About me: I recently had to ditch my nice commercial machine and big yard, for a 1/8 acre and "consumer grade" mower. Ended up with a Toro I got from the local dealer. Not bad. The engine specs out to be a 4.5 hp, but running at 2,800 rpm yields a net of 3.5 hp. Adequate for a normal yard. Not adequate to mow hay however.

I've been working on, fixing, rebuilding small equipment for years, mainly as a hobby.

So.. I was interested in how my little mower was built and how long it might last.

Quick notes:
- Many of the engines are made in China -- long gone are the Briggs stuff with "VacuJet" carbs you could service in 5 minutes. (I'm dating myself.) But the engine is not the #1 enemy here, it's more the deck rusting out, handle bar breaking, and if you have a self-propelled, the drive train (belt, cable, bearings, gears).
- You know the hype of "just add oil never change it?" Forget that. Change the oil once per year and maybe the plug and air filter too. Run the oil the thing came with for 3-5 hours then replace with full synth oil, like 10-30. And again, replace the oil once per year.

If you do all things right, be nice to your mower, change oil, don't bend the handle bar, don't leave it out in the rain, do clean the underside, do sharpen the blade -- what's the life expectancy? I say about 200 hours. More than that, you've got a keeper.

My machine (and your's probably) has a tranny build by General Transmissions. The little tranny (a helical gear set) has a synth housing (plastic) and metal gears, fully lubricated, no maintenance required, belt drive from engine to tranny. Assume sleeve bushings and who knows how good the gear metal is. This is your weak link. Again, engine s/b fine, but not the drive system. So I emailed these tranny guys asking about MTBF. Here's the response:

"I’m going to give you as good of an answer as I can. First, you have a residential unit made for approx. 30 hours of usage per season. We bench test the units up to 150 hours but they last longer. We can say with our testing and usage a good 2 years as a guarantee and most likely 5 years. We have had some not needing repair after 10 years of usage. It all depends on how it is handled and taken care of. They are a sealed unit and no service is needed but cleaning around it as well as the mower are of course recommended.

I hope this helps. My minimal answer would be yes, 2years/5years."

Right now you can buy replacement trannys for about $60... add a few hours of watching a YouTube and sticking it in there, you've got a new tranny. But that's now. What about 200 hours from now, maybe 10 years in my case? Nope, not me. I'll add it to all the stuff you see in FB Marketplace, "Great mower, self-propelled no workie, but it's a good push mower, and I only want $200 for it." Right.

So there you have your "consumer" use it and chuck it mentality. This really hasn't changed much in 30 years though. I remember the crappy friction drive mowers - you know, with the cogs in the wheels? This has got to be better.

Could I have bought a Honda with hydro? Yeah sure, but then it's still a little mower and for 3X the price. IMO there's a hole in the market. Take my new Toro, add a cast gear housing with tapered roller bearings and a heavier deck, and maybe $100 more, and you'd get 4X the life, or maybe a 20 year machine. Maybe a bigger engine so once it begins to lose compression, could still perform okay.

So there you have it. Moral of the story is, don't be cheap. Personally, if I ever have even a 3/4 acre, it's going to be a $4k low end ZTR. And instead of spending 1:15 walking, I'll spend 20 minutes riding -- and be the envy of the neighborhood and not boring the crap out of myself walking 5 miles each time I cut the grass. But that's just me

Love to know the model of Toro mower you bought. I don’t know which mower you have that has that engine and a tranny.

“About me: I recently had to ditch my nice commercial machine and big yard, for a 1/8 acre and "consumer grade" mower. Ended up with a Toro I got from the local dealer. Not bad. The engine specs out to be a 4.5 hp, but running at 2,800 rpm yields a net of 3.5 hp. Adequate for a normal yard. Not adequate to mow hay however.”

Second, if you have been working on engines like you say, you should know that 99% of lawn mowers engines should be running between 3000-3200 rpms. Set it to 3150 and I’ll bet you are close to 4.5 hp.

If if you are so knowledgeable about mowers, engines and trannies, why would you purchase a unit that could only last 2 years? My opinion about this thread, take it with a grain of salt, as you are only being given assumptions, not facts.

Hey mon, I'll get 10 years, I said that, but expect to buy a replacement tranny, especially if you have hills.

Voids warr to mod governor. Not like the old days, just take a loop out of the spring, get 4k rpm. I think most all new mowers are 2,800. Also push revs and power, create over heat issues, not to mention shorten engine life.

Toro rocks, be a Toro fan! Don't like Toro, MTD/Snapper/Troie-bilt/Crafts/... Get that $800 Honda with the hydro...

I know you are new to this forum, but if you look around a little you’ll find that I’m probably the biggest Toro guy around. I’ve been working for Toro dealers since the early 80’s and I think I probably know a little more about Toro’s than you do. How about telling us the model and serial of Toro mower you purchased. From that we would know exactly which engine, tranny, drive type, bushings, wheels, etc you have. How did you measure the rpms? I use an old fashion VibraTach, but the new wireless ones are nice, if you know how to use them. To my basic knowledge about the Toro mowers, there is not one that should be running at 2800 rpms, you’re just assuming that. Also, it will not void your warranty to have a Toro tech adjust your speed, especially since it’s under warranty since you just bought it. Even to a novice, if you understand how the different governors work, from the different service materials, you would know how to adjust them without changing spring size. As I said, you are using assumption, not facts.

Ha, nice to meet you as the Toro Guru around here!

It's model 20378, latest serial series, (no knob to adjust cable tension). And Kohler Chinese engine.

Yeah the shop guy said "2,800 rpm." Maybe he's stupid, dunno. Thing is, this ain't running at 3,600, and not even close to 3,400 by the sound of it. My former twin ran at 3,400. This Toro just loafs along at a nice, quiet speed.

I wound't want to up the speed. I've seen stuff go through decks, not to mention the grass bag or plastic mulch plug... And maybe the specs of this are wrong, but says it's 14ga. That's not too heavy. I'd go for more revs with a 10 ga deck.

So what I would love to mod, and go old school, forget the warranty, would be to add a throttle cable. Bugs me to shut the thing down at it's full rpm. This is the first anything I've had w/o a user setting for engine speed. Even my snow blower had a speed setting, although I always ran full bore (at 3,600 rpm), but could bring it down to idle and then shut down. Or the Toro could have 2 settings: Full speed and idle

Oh, forgot one thing.. Next time you talk to Toro, please remind them it would be nice to include a printed "use and care" manual with machine. I had to print one out from a PDF download.

You bought the third cheapest mower in the Toro line, what do you expect? The purchase price you paid bought you a Pinto, but you expected delivery of a Shelby Mustang. Did you do any research before you made your purchase? Everything you want in a mower is not available at any price. I’m not going change your mind, I’ve let others know about your misguided wants, so I’m out of this thread. Hope your mechanical skills are better than your wants.

Hahahah LOL... I'm impressed. You know more than the Toro dealer I bought this from! 8k posts... amazing. I mean I'd have to be on Welfare to have that much time... I hope you have like a consulting business and are charging dealers for all your expertise.

There is a massive problem with the buying public now days which is getting worse and will eventually lead to the collapse of the entire USA manufacturing industry outside of defence. And Australia is no better.
And that is the total unwllingness of the public to pay a fair & reasonable price for anything.
In order for manufacturers to meet this greedy desire they have to make mowers cheaper and cheaper.
One of the ways they do that is to remove throttle controls.
It is no surprise that most of the top shelf mower companies have gone to the wall.
Honda stopped making mower engines for anything other than their own range of walk behinds because they refused to make rubbish.
For the same reason they abandoned the ride on market
Eaton did the same with mower hydraulics.

Toro make a large range of mowers .
You bought at the bottom end so don't expect to get a top shelf mower .
If you did not like the features it had then why did you buy it in the first place ?
Plenty of Briggs on a bowl out there for you to purchase.
If you can't stand the Toro, sell it & buy something else.
Walmart have plenty of fully imported mowers with controllable throttles guaranteed to almost work till the 90 day warranty period ends, in your price range.

A while back i made the big mistake of getting roped into a pay for advice internet group.
Fortunately sufficient people were so upset by being told the truth about what they bought , my contract was cancelled.
It is no surprise if you go to sites like Product Review or Whirlpool 99% of the complaints were about bottom end products & services.

I am sorry if Rivets telling you the plain truth hurt your feelings and I have no doubt I will no longer be in your good books either.
Because neither of us are into telling people BS in order to make friends or make them fell better about making bad decisions.

It amazes me at times when people bitch about a product that they barely paid enough for to cover the transport cost of getting the mower from the factory to the store let alone the cost of the fairy bread to feed the pixies in the factory who make mowers from woffil dust because the raw materials are way too expensive to make mowers from steel & aluminium.