My mower repair thread

I got my first ever return yesterday, the Chonda powered Yard Pro. It's hnting severely and stalling, just like when I got it. It had worked fine when I had it, buddy used it for 30 minutes and it won't tun right. He'd rather have the mower than his money back, so I'll see what I can do. The other Chonda I picked up yesterday also doesn't run any more. It coughs, sputters and files flames out of the exhaust, ran fine hours before. As a rule, I no longer want anything to do with those, I'm very discouraged right now because of those.
 
Vervepipes said:
I got my first ever return yesterday, the Chonda powered Yard Pro. It's hnting severely and stalling, just like when I got it. It had worked fine when I had it, buddy used it for 30 minutes and it won't tun right. He'd rather have the mower than his money back, so I'll see what I can do. The other Chonda I picked up yesterday also doesn't run any more. It coughs, sputters and files flames out of the exhaust, ran fine hours before. As a rule, I no longer want anything to do with those, I'm very discouraged right now because of those.
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That's a bummer. I had a Tecumseh powered Craftsman that ran well right up until the woman came to look at it. It would not start for here. In fact I couldn't get it running ever again. No idea what happened. I tried and tried to figure it out. Replaced the coil, carburetor, checked the flywheel key. It had spark, it had compression, it wouldn't so much as cough. Eventually I ripped it off the deck and stripped it for parts. :mad:
 
One of the worst things about yesterday was that I had a self propelled deck that was in good shape, but when I put the new Chonda on it, the deck was very crooked somehow, the blade went almost an inch below the deck only on one side of the mower, so it wasn't the crank or blade. There was nothing obstructing the engine install, so it wasn't that the motor was crooked. When I put the Chonda back on it's old deck in hopes that maybe the customer would take that one in exchange for the non running Chonda, it wouldn't run. Now I have two cheap garbage China motors taking up space. I'm going to try to clean the carb again and put an inline filter on the first one though, maybe something in the tank found it's way to the carb.
 
So this morning the Chonda that I purchased for $40 ran, it must have not liked being washed. I swapped out the motor after two hours of fiddling and false starts on that POS. I found a better belt, put that on, tested it out on my lawn and delivered it. My profit on that mower is now only about $20. The deck that the newer Chonda came from has a lot of paint peel but is solid and the drive system works, has all the covers etc, so I'l going to strip it and repaint it, then find a suitable engine for it. I'd prefer a troublesome Tecumseh to a POS Chonda any day. Maybe I'll try to build a running Quantum from all the parts units I have and put a pulley on it.
 
So I've noticed that due to scrapping so many mowers I now have a large amount of bags. While it's nice to happen to have a bag for almost anything that I come across, my storage space is limited and I don't have room for 30-40 bags. I've decided that tomorrow I'm sorting through my bags, keeping one or two of each mounting style, and listing the rest on Kijiji. I figure at $10 per soft bag I'll make a bit of beer money and clear up some needed room. I'm keeping the hard and partially hard bags though, they look nicer on a well kept mower and I think they increase resale value by a reasonable amount. Next step in reclaiming lost space is tearing down parted out engines for scrap aluminum. I'll leave the steel bits in a box by the curb, not worth much per pound.
 
Vervepipes said:
So I've noticed that due to scrapping so many mowers I now have a large amount of bags. While it's nice to happen to have a bag for almost anything that I come across, my storage space is limited and I don't have room for 30-40 bags. I've decided that tomorrow I'm sorting through my bags, keeping one or two of each mounting style, and listing the rest on Kijiji. I figure at $10 per soft bag I'll make a bit of beer money and clear up some needed room. I'm keeping the hard and partially hard bags though, they look nicer on a well kept mower and I think they increase resale value by a reasonable amount. Next step in reclaiming lost space is tearing down parted out engines for scrap aluminum. I'll leave the steel bits in a box by the curb, not worth much per pound.
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Wish I had that problem! I run into bag deficiency problems a lot. Right now, I've got two rear baggers withe the same style bag mount and only one bag...
 
Almost all the bags are MTD bags though. One Lawn Boy rear discharge style bag, a few electric mower bags. The problem I've found with AYP/Husqvarna bags is that they have a lot of different mounting styles, so I have a bunch of those too, but they seem to have changed fairly often. I do go through a lot of mowers, I probably tear down at least 5 per week for scrap because they are too deteriorated to ever be used safely again, and a lot of those have bags. If it would make financial sense I would help you out but shipping would be killer!
 
Being a nice day I decided to take the John Deere out for a trial run. The drive system seized half way through the lawn. It works on full speed propel, not any other speed, and is locked from just pushing. I know the drive system was weak in these from the reviews but man, it didn't last long for me. The retaining clips for the wheel sprockets are now one with the sprocket, they would need to be cut off somehow to remove the sprocket. The cost of a new rear axle, or even a used one, does not seem like a good investment given this model's known unreliability. I think the engine will go on another self propelled mower and the rest will be parted out on Ebay. First I'll look inside the gearbox to see if it's a fatal wound it has, but I don't want a money pit, that's for sure.
 
I picked up 6 mowers today all at once on my lunch break, glad I took my van to work. This one seemed like the quickest to get together. The engine was missing it's oil plug and the crank case was filled with brown water. I replaced the engine with an old Canadian Tire mower that looked neat and vintage early 80's, but the deck had a lot of shoddy welds. I had to tighten the spark plug, not sure why it was loose. A fresh oil change, sponge filter cleaned, deck cleaned, replaced the rusted muffler and I now have a nice beater mower for sale. I mowed the front lawn with it and it cuts very well. I expect a few emails and calls for it in the next few hours, that's been the trend with these beaters, average list time seems to be about two hours before they sell.





I promised the kids some time at the playground today, so I may have to work in the dark to break down more mowers. I really hope my list of ordered ebay parts get here quickly so I can regain some shed space.
 
This guy suffered from the same fate as the red MTD, left out partially disassembled with a crankcase full of brown water, I wasn't thinking and thought I'd use the carb to get another mower running only to find a vaseline like jelly in the manifold, so I left it aside to clean out later. This mower was also part of the six I had just picked up. I took the engine off of another of the six who's deck was broken almost in half in a leap of faith that it ran despite the deck's condition. Success! It sputtered to life with no smoke at all on start up. I don't know the oil's condition other than there was some in it, so I only ran it for a few seconds. Tomorrow I'll need to sharpen the blade, clean the deck, change the oil and spark plug, and test mow. The rear flap spring seems weak, I may have another similar deck I can take springs from, or maybe they just need to be re-seated. The deck is rusty underneath but no holes or cracks, so this one will also be marketed as a beater but as I said before there is a huge market for those.


Photos were taken around 10PM, so they aren't very nice but gives an idea.

The red MTD from before may be sold, somebody called tonight wanting to get it after work tomorrow. They say looks don't matter as long as it runs they'll take it. I think that I have only one mower left that I got today that I haven't looked at, a 6.75HP Tecumseh Craftsman, not self propelled with a rotten deck and jury rigged throttle/governor wire...cable...thing. The primer has a hole so I'll try some barb cleaner to see it it has spark first of all.

On a side not, I've discovered a hazard of working after dark by flashlight. June bugs are VERY attracted to any light, especially a bright LED on my phone. I'll pack it in when the sun goes down from now on.
 
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