B & D electric mower switch wont work

[jcritchie]

Hi. I have a two year old B & D electric mower, model MM275, that stopped working while mowing some really high grass and tripped the circuit breaker in the garage. I saw a video that said I probably needed to replace the rectifier, which I did. Now it runs, but the safety switch wont work.

The mower starts right after I plug the extension cord into it without me having touched the safety switch. The mower will run and raising and lowering the switch does nothing. I accidentally bent the contact that the black wire with the metal slide-on connector on it goes on, over about half an inch. I pushed it back up. Did I maybe break something inside the rectifier and cause this problem? Or do I need a new switch?

Thanks for any advice.

 

[jcritchie]

I took the safety switch apart and didn't see anything that looked burned or loose. I pushed the on/off button a few times and it seemed OK. I put it back together and plugged in the AC cord and the problem's still there. I guess the ON position got fused into place when the rectifier blew and my pressing the button didn't fix anything. I just ordered a new on/off switch for my mower and I'll see if that fixes it.