My son and I found this mower by the side of the road some years ago. It had no spark plug or oil in it, but was otherwise intact and appeared to be worth a closer look; so onto the truck and home it went.
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I looked underneath it and something looked amiss. There was a reasonably sound-looking mulching blade on it, but it had been installed upside down. One wonders if the mower's owner had a thought something like, "I just sharpened that blade and put it back on and it cuts worse than ever. To heck with it. Time for a new mower." Had he retraced his steps, he might have figured out that he'd converted his lawnmower into a lawn flogger.
In any event, I flipped the blade over, filled the sump with oil, installed a spark plug and it started and ran fine. It cut grass too. Not a bad find.
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The mower has to spend winters out on the patio. I have no shed or garage to keep it in, so I've come up with a little winter-proofing regimen that's not a lot of work, and gives me very good odds of a trouble-free startup in the spring. It goes like this:
1) Remove the spark plug. Spray in some WD-40. Replace the spark plug and give the starter cord a few pulls to distribute the WD-40.
2) Remove the following items:
- Fuel tank.
- Air cleaner.
- Cowl w/recoil starter. (The recoil starter's cord is best kept inside where it'll stay dry. It'll last much longer that way.)
- Governor linkage plate w/link and spring. N.B. -- Unless you're one of those natural-born mechanics who can just intuit how things go back together, you're well advised to draw yourself a clear sketch of something like a governor linkage arrangement. It may not be obvious to you what goes where come the spring.
- Carburettor.
4) Clean all the removed items. Take the float bowl off the carburettor, clean it and leave it off.
5) Stash all the removed items together in a box.
6) Pinch the crankcase vent tube shut with a binder clip.
7) Bung up the engine's intake port with a cork. In the following photograph, that's a synthetic wine bottle cork that I've whittled down for the purpose.
8) Blow off all the accumulated grass and stuff with compressed air.
9) Spray the muffler down with WD-40. Apply WD-40 anyplace that looks like it could use it -- cable ends, pivot points, what-have-you.
And here we are. The only thing left is to slip a garbage bag over it for a cover and tie it in place. Winter can do as it pleases; the engine will be snug.
Come spring, check the carburettor's float level, reassemble everything, oil the air cleaner element, fuel it up and away you go.
I didn't mention changing the oil. I really should have done that first here, but I was too lazy to. I'll do it first thing in the spring.
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