Fixing an Abandoned, but New Mower

Commish · 2009-07-16T14:04:47+00:00

OK, the mower. The neighbor across the street moved and left his mowerwith other neighbor across the street. It's a nice walk behind mowerwith multiple walking speeds. Neighbor offered the mower to me while Ifind the time to repair the broken drive belt on my old/current mower.(Walk behind mowers are not meant to be pushed once the walk behindfunction fails.)OK, about the new, loaner mower. Neighbor 1 had a lawn service andafter buying a new mower and using it once or twice... it was retired- several summers ago. And has spent several years in his shed. Itlooks practically, brand new.So, of course, it won't start, we put in fuel - of course. And Ipulled the starter. Nothing. Not a spark or a sputter. Plenty of oil.Nice clean looking oil I might add. So, I replaced the spark plug andpulled again. Nothing. Not a spark or a sputter.So, what do I need to do to try and get this engine to turn over? Ifthe mower was stored with fuel, which has evaporated, how do I cleanout the evaporated, gummed up fuel. New fuel lines? New fuel filter?I'm thinking that replacing the drive belt may be the easier fix....

Jul 16, 2009 23 Replies

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gfretwell 17 years ago

You can just squirt some gas directly in the carb put the air cleaner back on, pull it a couple times. If it runs a second or two you have a fuel problem.

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DerbyDad03 17 years ago

re: "I wouldn't put to much money in it...You can get a new one for

200 bucks"

My carb was shot, the front wheels were bald, the blade was dull and the blade mounting assembly was cracked. Close to $150 if I did the work myself.

For another $100 or so, I got a brand new self-propelled mulching Honda with auto-choke and a 2 year warranty. Taking it out of the box was a lot less work than trying to fix the other one. Well worth the extra $100.

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BetaB4 17 years ago

Since it is a self-propelled mower, I vote for the suggestion someone wrote about checking for a kill/safety switch or device.

Maybe you could look up the make and model on the Internet and download an owner's manual/instructions. There may be inforamtion in there about a kill/safety device.

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