TroyBilt Garden tractor with defective Kohler engine

The last Kohler that inhale a screw I got lucky on. Still had to replace the head. The screws were steel and finally one got embedded in the piston, the other passed through. I cleaned up the damage and install two brass screws which I staked in place along with blue Loctite. If I remember correctly they are M3-0.5 X 5 pan head brass screws which are the same many Nikki carburetors used on the Kawasaki engine are here too losing screws out the carburetors.

I had few engines where screws have crushed the top ring groove which means the piston and rings have to be replaced along with the cylinder head assy.
 
I purchased my TroyBilt mower at Tractor Supply in Monroe, WA in May of 2021. Tractor Supply does not do warranty work, and after 30 days they will not take the mower back OR assist with warranty issues. The engine started smoking during the first few uses, and eventually would die. I replaced the spark plug twice and the engine would run ok for a short time then die. The plug electrode would be smashed again. The mower sat for the winter, and when used again at the beginning of this season, it again smashed the plug. I took the mower to the Mower Shop, and they got it running again. The Mower Shop said there was something in the piston chamber and they cleaned it out and replaced the head gasket. The Kohler engine was defective, Kohler agreed to cover that problem under warranty. The mower was at the Mower Shop in Seattle for a month that time, and when I picked it up, it did the same thing as before after less than an hour of use. I took it back to the Mower Shop, and it has been there for another 2 weeks. The Mower Shop gave me a ticket number, #353130 and said Kohler has not sent a replacement motor. I called Kohler and Kohler sent me back to the Mower Shop. Kohler would not update me or give me any information about my mower, and their automated call center sent me to their parts center who is not part of Kohler, and they could not help me. The Mower Shop is supposedly waiting for Kohler to send a motor. I was never rude or demanding, I simply wanted the mower repaired. It's been 6 weeks and I'm in a revolving door between the repair shop (authorized by Kohler) and the engine manufacturer, Kohler. No end in sight, no mower, no refund so I can buy something else, mowing my 2/3-acre lawn with a borrowed Honda HRB215 that runs great, but takes more energy than a 69-year-old man can safely generate. Kohler doesn't have bad a bad customer service policy; they don't have one at all.
5/13/22 update. Finally got hold of Kohler service and talked to Paul. He said it could take 6 weeks to get a replacement motor to the repair shop as they produce motors for warranties as needed. My mower has been in the shop for 6 weeks already, and it could be another month just to get the parts, plus installation time. Paul said he would contact The Mower Shop in Seattle to see what is going on, but Paul never called me back.
 
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Scrubcadet10 said:
The only way i can think of a plug electrode getting smashed is Piston contact... either too long of a plug is being used, or there is excess play in the wrist pin or connecting rod big end.... but you'd hear it rattling.
What is the model of the engine and what is the spark plug part number.... Also, considering the puffs of smoke....i wonder if the head gasket wasn't placed during assembly.
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The original Kohler plug got smashed after just a few uses. The motor would send out a puff of smoke every so often right from day one, then would get real bad all of a sudden and the motor would die. I was told it could be bad gas so I drained and installed new gas even though it was new gas to begin with. Installed new plugs twice with the same result. Repair shop said debris was in the piston chamber and did some "Pitting" on the piston. They took a month to "Fix" it, but on return it lasted less than an hour before doing the same thing. The Mower Shop says they are waiting for Kohler to provide a new engine....6 weeks total now and Kohler has no customer service rep. They delegate that duty to the approved repair shop....
 
Rivets said:
Have you contacted Kohler engine technical support directly at one of these two numbers. If not you have not, you have nothing to loose in doing so. If you do call them, have the following information on hand.
Model and Serial numbers of the tractor
All information off the Kohler ID tag, model, serial and spec numbers.
Date of purchase
All dates it has been in the shop, and everything they told you and copies of the work orders To let them know exactly what the shop did And how they handled your problem.
When you get to talk to them, remember that honey works better than vinegar. Remember you want to work with them to resolve the problem. Don’t start off with demands, they will shut you down very quickly. It’s not a bad idea to write down your concerns beforehand, so you answers to any questions they have.
It would surprise me greatly if you don‘t get some help, if your willing to put all your bad experiences out of the picture when talking to them.

+1-800-456-4537. +1-920-457-4441
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Just called the Kohler service person and spoke with Paul. I was told that it could take another month and a half for Kohler to get a replacement motor to the repair shop. Kohler motors are made in Wisconsin. According to Paul, Kohler has to produce replacement motors per order, as they do not stock replacements. That's ridiculous. This is a motor that's less than a year old. All I was ever given by the Mower Shop in Seattle was a ticket number 353130, which turned out to be the Mower Shop ticket, not a Kohler repair number. Kohler said they have no information about the ticket, and they told me to contact the Mower Shop! Bottom line...Kohler service is horrible, and they simply say it is too bad for me to not have a mower for 3 months even though it is under warranty. This is mowing season and I paid for what should have been a working mower.
 
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This thread is getting very confusing to me. To me, either your repair shop is very Incompetent and giving you a line of BS or we are missing valuable parts of the story. A repair shop that can’t find the reason a spark plugs electrode is being smashed shouldn’t be an authorized dealer. I can only think of three reasons for this to occur, wrong plug reach, debris in the cylinder or internal problem. If it’s not one of the first two, they should be tearing into the engine. Since I can’t be of more help, I’m backing out of this thread.
 
Seattle Troy-Built with K said:
Just called the Kohler service person and spoke with Paul. I was told that it could take another month and a half for Kohler to get a replacement motor to the repair shop. Kohler motors are made in Wisconsin. According to Paul, Kohler has to produce replacement motors per order, as they do not stock replacements. That's ridiculous. This is a motor that's less than a year old. All I was ever given by the Mower Shop in Seattle was a ticket number 353130, which turned out to be the Mower Shop ticket, not a Kohler repair number. Kohler said they have no information about the ticket, and they told me to contact the Mower Shop! Bottom line...Kohler service is horrible, and they simply say it is too bad for me to not have a mower for 3 months even though it is under warranty. This is mowing season and I paid for what should have been a working mower.
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As I said before but your SOTL obviously prevented you believing it.
YOU are not Kohlers customer and they have no warranty obligations to YOU
the MOWER factory is Kohlers customer & they have the warranty obligations with them.
You have been told how the warranty system works but prefer to ignore it .

And yes Kohler probably do not have a complete replacement engine in stock .
Modern manufacturing proceedure is "Just in Time " so production is scheduled such that the engines will come off the line & go directly onto the truck that takes them to the various factories where they come off the back of the truck and go directly into the mowers.
There is no inventory on the shop floor because that costs money so Kohler & the mower factory will at best have a days worth of production parts ( including engines ) sitting on the floor.

In many cases that means hourly deliveries .
So to give your distributor an engine for your mower means that some one else will be short an engine .
Supply contracts have big fines for failing to supply the parts in exactly the right quantities at exactly the right times .
On better quality mowers with bigger profit margins then Kohler may keep some floor stock but in most cases there is none at all because profit margins are so slim.
Kohler would be lucky to be getting a gross mark up of 10% over cost and paying overdraft fees for engines sitting on the floor will kill that in no time flat .

Find some one with a delivery contract to a manufacturer and get them to explain it to you
 
Warranties are written by lawyers so the provider has to do nothing about anything if they don't want to do.

I had my run in with Kohler too. An engine that I had called Kohler tech support about and was told the engine was under under warranty and to carry the defective ignition coils to a local to have them made. Well no local dealer would honor the warranty since they had not sold the engine to me. I ended up covering the labor and parts were installed at cost. I discuss this with ahead of the time and he agree to my terms as he was needing the ZTR mower back operating instead of playing mind games with the OEM and their dealers.

I also had problems with Briggs not honoring their new parts warranty. Basically you buy our products if defective the attitude is screw you, we don't care as we got your money.

This type of service is the same type I did for a dealer were he honored warranties out his own pocket as he couldn't even get the OEMs to honor their warranties even when he was an authorized dealer. So basically I do the same here on anything I sell. So it is just one reason that I am a repair only shop. It is just too hoops to jump thru trying to get an OEM to honor their warranty.

For this reason I never will again buy a new mower. I am lucky to know how to repair them but rather let some else go through the hassles of trying to get warranty service. Basically I buy a product knowing warranties are just worthless pieces of paper which are not honored unless they forced to. Heck I am a dealer for Sunbelt products and I can't even get them to honor their warranty to me on the parts they sold to me. It is why I am dropping their products from my shop and have gone to Stens.

At least RBI is accepting back the five Oregon spindles I recently purchased from them because they had no grease zerks. Two of them got installed before I knew they didn't have the zerks. I trusted they were right. Oh I could have disassembled them, installed zerks, and reassemble but I probably would had to installed new seals with the cost out my pocket. Nothing was wrong with the spindles if used with spindle shafts that drilled for greasing.
 
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