Kawasaki or Kohler

[Auto Doc's]

Hi H.,

In my area customers still have the habit of buying new mowers of all sizes and simply running them until they fail for one reason or another. Most survive long enough for the warranty to run out and then they blame the equipment.

Many times, the engine get blamed for failing, but it usually leads back to poor oil changes, air cleaner choking up and air-cooling fins that have never been cleaned.

I would think that with the massive increases in yard equipment prices in the past year, that people would wise up and take better care of their equipment. Nope, not going to happen as long as easy credit and financing exist.

 

[Tiger Small Engine]

Kohler/Rehlko's biggest mistake was trying to play in the consumer market. Should have just stayed with their commercial use engines.

The FR series Kawasaki is one of the most common Kawasaki engines I see by far. It is a residential engine.

The bottom like is that the Kohler Courage gave Kohler a black eye that has continued to exist years later. Remember, the 7000 series Kohler is simply a redesigned Courage. Every car manufacturer has produced a lemon at one time. This discussion comes up and it is the same thing. Briggs and Stratton makes a good solid engine also. Rarely do engines run into the upper hour ranges of capability in residential use. Therefore, many of these specific points are mute. One of the most critical parts we are not talking about is maintenance. You can have a Cadillac, but if you don’t change the oil it ain’t going to last as long, or perform as well. Many/most people do a poor job of maintenance on their outdoor power equipment. That is a blanket statement I can make.

 

[ILENGINE]

The FR series Kawasaki is one of the most common Kawasaki engines I see by far. It is a residential engine.

The bottom like is that the Kohler Courage gave Kohler a black eye that has continued to exist years later. Remember, the 7000 series Kohler is simply a redesigned Courage. Every car manufacturer has produced a lemon at one time. This discussion comes up and it is the same thing. Briggs and Stratton makes a good solid engine also. Rarely do engines run into the upper hour ranges of capability in residential use. Therefore, many of these specific points are mute. One of the most critical parts we are not talking about is maintenance. You can have a Cadillac, but if you don’t change the oil it ain’t going to last as long, or perform as well. Many/most people do a poor job of maintenance on their outdoor power equipment. That is a blanket statement I can make.

Everybody complained about the issues with the Courage single with its problems that were later solved. But nobody mentions the 5400 series which was the modern version of that engine which has now also been discontinued. Or the Courage twin which for the most part other than the starter issue was a fairly reliable engine, but very few issues with the 7000 series which was the modern version of that engine.

 

[hlw49]

FR residential engine comes on residential mowers FS Comes on some low-end commercial mowers.
FX is their top-of-the-line commercial engine. At a service school one year Kawasaki said their goal was to be the best commercial engine on the market. I thinks to myself you need to fix the valve train. Funky set up.

 

[Auto Doc's]

FR residential engine comes on residential mowers FS Comes on some low-end commercial mowers.
FX is their top-of-the-line commercial engine. At a service school one year Kawasaki said their goal was to be the best commercial engine on the market. I thinks to myself you need to fix the valve train. Funky set up.

Hi hlw49,

They want to be the "best" commercial engine on the market??? To me that translates to the cheapest build cost for the most profit.

 

[Skippydiesel]

What on earth is a "residential" engine??? Look up the word residential - "designed for people to live in."

Do you mean domestic, as apposed to commercial grade??

 

[Auto Doc's]

Residential mowers are light duty "homeowner" units, occasional use only run for a few hours at a time or less.

Commercial mowers are a daily use heavy duty machine run under heavy use for many more hours.

Engineers are wise to these applications according to "predetermined failure rate ratios". This data is collected on a regular basis for new machines.

If they did these same studies and building techniques 40 years ago, the Snapper rear engine riders would not have been as reliable or survived as long.

Mowers are currently built with a very limited time of useable life. It sounds evil, but it is reality. How else would they continue to sell more products?

 

[ILENGINE]

Residential grade or consumer engines are normally designed for a life expectancy of less than 750 hours. Semi commercial or prosumer is the 750-1500 hour engines and true commercial engines are 1500+ hr engines.

And like Auto Doc said: "If they did these same studies and building techniques 40 years ago, the Snapper rear engine riders would not have been as reliable or survived as long." And in later years of production they did just that and turned the rear engine Snapper into a 5 year expectant life span mower.

Good example is everybody likes to complain about the no oil change push mower engine from Briggs. That engine is designed with the prescribed maintenance to be a 125 hour engine. But from market research the average person only uses a push mower 12 hours per year, so in reality that engine is considered to have a 10 year life span.

 

[Auto Doc's]

Residential grade or consumer engines are normally designed for a life expectancy of less than 750 hours. Semi commercial or prosumer is the 750-1500 hour engines and true commercial engines are 1500+ hr engines.

And like Auto Doc said: "If they did these same studies and building techniques 40 years ago, the Snapper rear engine riders would not have been as reliable or survived as long." And in later years of production they did just that and turned the rear engine Snapper into a 5 year expectant life span mower.

Good example is everybody likes to complain about the no oil change push mower engine from Briggs. That engine is designed with the prescribed maintenance to be a 125 hour engine. But from market research the average person only uses a push mower 12 hours per year, so in reality that engine is considered to have a 10 year life span.

Hello ILENGINE,

I had one of those none service B&S engines a couple of months ago on a DR trimmer and the customer was puzzled because he could not find the drain plug. I used a suction tool and emptied it out and put new oil in it for him.

The argument I have heard by many of the environmental purist is the drain plug was eliminated to keep the DIY types from simply draining the oil out on the ground.

On the other side of the situation, engineers were able to speed up production by eliminating the extra machining steps and cost. and the additional weight of a drain tube or steel drain plug.

Ultimately, if people cannot service it themself, most will just run them until the eventual failure.

 

[Skippydiesel]

There can not be any such thing as a residential engine - it would have to be big enough for a person to live in.

If you accept the use of residential you are buying in to meaningless marketing gobeledy gook!