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Good morning/afternoon,

I have been given a Craftsman lawn tractor from my in-laws. They had it for a few years and took care of it well, until it stopped moving in their yard. They offered it to me if I could get it moving again. Turns out it was just the drive belt.

While replacing the drive belt, I tipped the mower on it's right side (it was on a slight incline with tall grass around it and hard to access the underside). I replaced the belt, got the mower moving and took it home. I ran it for about another hour cutting the grass in my front yard. I parked it for the night and let it be.

The next day, I went to start it up and found out it had been leaking fuel, and quite a lot of it. It went from nearly full to under half tank. I took some time to diagnose where the fuel was leaking from and I determined it was coming from the carburetor. I rebuilt the carburetor and put it back on. After that the mower wouldn't start anymore. It began by being very noisy and spitting a lot of fluid out of the exhaust. It was suggested to me to remove the spark plug and try to crank it so it would get all the fluid out. I did that and nothing really helped.

Since then, I have drained the oil and filled it fresh with a new filter, and replaced the spark plug. It still does not start, and is very noisy for a few moments while it tries to crank , but it quits after a few seconds of trying to turn over and makes a steady errrrrrrrr sound.

This is a Craftsman
21 HP, 42" Mower
Electric Start
Automatic Transmission
Model # 917.289220

Briggs & Stratton Engine Model 331877
Type number 1234-B1

Let me know if I need to provide any more information.

Please and thank you!

What has happened is the crab has leaked fuel into the engine and when you tried to crank it the cylinder had more liquid in it than the compressed combustion chamber.
This will cause one or more of the following in roughly this order.
Blown head gasket
Bent con rod
Broken piston rings
bent push rod

So it will be major overhaul / replacement engine time

download the engine service manual from here http://www.mymowerparts.com/about_us.php

bertsmobile1 said:

What has happened is the crab has leaked fuel into the engine and when you tried to crank it the cylinder had more liquid in it than the compressed combustion chamber.
This will cause one or more of the following in roughly this order.
Blown head gasket
Bent con rod
Broken piston rings
bent push rod

So it will be major overhaul / replacement engine time

download the engine service manual from here http://www.mymowerparts.com/about_us.php

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, the numbers identifying the manuals there are not making any sense to me... I am not sure which one I am looking for.

Sorry, Wrong link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6NaqjIxWV1ybEN0LWo3azl6OUU/view?usp=drive_web

bertsmobile1 said:

Sorry, Wrong link
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B6NaqjIxWV1ybEN0LWo3azl6OUU/view?usp=drive_web

Click to expand...

Ah, thank you. Anyways, good news! The mower is running again, mostly in part to me being dumb. (Wasn't using the choke) Anyways, how long might it take for it to burn off the oil/gas that was all over the engine? It's letting off a bit of white smoke and is a slight bit stuttery.

Anything up to an hour or so.
Take it out after dark and let it run for a while so the smoke can't be seen cause if you can't see it it didnt happen did it ?

bertsmobile1 said:

Anything up to an hour or so.
Take it out after dark and let it run for a while so the smoke can't be seen cause if you can't see it it didnt happen did it ?

Click to expand...

Haha, nice. Thanks for the assistance.