Repairs Honda HRX217HYA

Petik

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I purchased a brand new one yesterday at the local home depot. Brought it home and after adding oil and fuel it fired right up. This is my first Honda and I am so far very impressed with how easy it starts and how nimble it is given the size.

This mower has the roto-stop feature where the blade has a clutch engage on it operated by a lever on the handle. The manual says to engage the blade clutch level sharply (not gradually) to save the wear on clutch.

Now to my problem...when I engage the blade clutch, the motor stumbles and sometime stalls, even when I engage it sharply and even if the motor has warmed up. I even managed to stall the mower a couple of time in some 4-6" rye grass where my old POS battery mower managed to get through. So given that this is the more powerful 190cc honda motor, I'm thinking there may be a problem with the blade engage setting or the throttle adjustment when blade is engaged.

Guys at the HD are pretty useless at helping me out with this and I don't really want to take the mower back if I can avoid it. If I can't figure it out on my own I might take it to a local Honda shop if I can find one.

Can anyone comment how this can be adjusted or if this expected?
 

Carscw

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Bring it back they will give you a new one

Sent from my iPhone using LMF
 

robert@honda

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I have a 1-year old HRX and it does the same thing (sometimes stalls when engaging the blade). I've discovered a few tricks to avoid the problem:
(a) Make sure the engine is fully warmed up. Give it a good two minutes even on a warm day to get fully up to temp.
(b) Don't engage the blades on uncut grass. Especially critical if you have the mowing height set to a lower position.
(c) Press down on the handlebars slightly to raise the front of the mower deck when engaging the blades. Once up to speed, lower the deck slowly.

All that said, it is possible the throttle lever, throttle cable or governor are out of spec. You'd need a tachometer to confirm the engine speed (blades engaged, throttle to FAST) is 2,950~3,100 rpm. This is checked at the factory on every unit, so it's unlikely to be the problem. -Robert@Honda

Caveat: I work for Honda, but the preceding was my opinion alone.
 

Petik

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I have a 1-year old HRX and it does the same thing (sometimes stalls when engaging the blade). I've discovered a few tricks to avoid the problem:
(a) Make sure the engine is fully warmed up. Give it a good two minutes even on a warm day to get fully up to temp.
(b) Don't engage the blades on uncut grass. Especially critical if you have the mowing height set to a lower position.
(c) Press down on the handlebars slightly to raise the front of the mower deck when engaging the blades. Once up to speed, lower the deck slowly.

All that said, it is possible the throttle lever, throttle cable or governor are out of spec. You'd need a tachometer to confirm the engine speed (blades engaged, throttle to FAST) is 2,950~3,100 rpm. This is checked at the factory on every unit, so it's unlikely to be the problem. -Robert@Honda

Caveat: I work for Honda, but the preceding was my opinion alone.

Thanks for the info Robert. Is this an expected behavior for all of these Honda mowers with roto-stop? I do see this regardless of how warmed up the motor is. I definitely see engaging the blades on uncut grass to pretty much always stall the motor, but oddly even sometime on already cut grass or off grass entirely. I'd rather take it to a service center than return it - last thing I want is to get another with the same or other issues.
 

justus11

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I own an older HRX and it also hesitates when engaging the blade. I don't engage too quickly, I let the blade catch up with the motor.

As far as killing when in the tall grass. What is the height your deck is set at? Bare minimum should be 2 1/2", I prefer to cut @ 3". I get a much plusher and healthier lawn. I also recommend not letting the grass get this tall before cutting. They recommend never removing more than 1/3 of the grass height at a time, so if you have really tall grass you may have to raise the deck all the way up and cut, wait a couple or even a few days and cut again with the deck lowered.

Good luck.
Rick
 

robert@honda

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I'd rather take it to a service center than return it - last thing I want is to get another with the same or other issues.

If you do take it to a dealer, call first and explain you'd like to have it inspected and confirm everything is within spec. Be sure to agree on a time/schedule, as most dealers are very busy doing service work right now (that time of year).

Here's a link to find a dealer in your area:

Honda Power Equipment - Find a dealer

-Robert@Honda

Caveat: I work for Honda, but the preceding was my opinion alone.
 

Petik

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I own an older HRX and it also hesitates when engaging the blade. I don't engage too quickly, I let the blade catch up with the motor.

As far as killing when in the tall grass. What is the height your deck is set at? Bare minimum should be 2 1/2", I prefer to cut @ 3". I get a much plusher and healthier lawn. I also recommend not letting the grass get this tall before cutting. They recommend never removing more than 1/3 of the grass height at a time, so if you have really tall grass you may have to raise the deck all the way up and cut, wait a couple or even a few days and cut again with the deck lowered.

Good luck.
Rick

Rick,

I hear ya, and I know that's the procedure for an ideal lawn in a lot of cases. But down here the grass grows like wildfire in the spring and even mowing every weekend, you may be mowing 50%+ of the grass height.

I also seed winter rye for the winter to keep the dogs from destroying the yard...so I need to cut it down real short around this time to let the bermuda take back over for the summer.

Either way, although I'm aware of the best practices, part of the reason I bought a higher end mower with a more powerful motor was so that I wouldn't be stalling it in just slightly taller grass...

I might take it back just to see if another is the same way and go from there. I still like it quite a bit, but I was expecting more power.
 

stygz

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I own an older HRX and it also hesitates when engaging the blade. I don't engage too quickly, I let the blade catch up with the motor.

As far as killing when in the tall grass. What is the height your deck is set at? Bare minimum should be 2 1/2", I prefer to cut @ 3". I get a much plusher and healthier lawn. I also recommend not letting the grass get this tall before cutting. They recommend never removing more than 1/3 of the grass height at a time, so if you have really tall grass you may have to raise the deck all the way up and cut, wait a couple or even a few days and cut again with the deck lowered.

Good luck.
Rick


He has Bermuda grass and may be cutting it at about 1"-1.5". Bermuda is supposed to be cut very short. Some types of bermuda gets cut less than 1" (think golf course). Bermuda gets really thick when cut low....just like fescule when cut long (I lived in WI).

Cutting 1/3 off will bog down my Lawn Boy Platinum with a 6.75 B+S motor. So I am looking at a Honda mower.
 
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