Tuesday, May 26, 2009

The Importance Of Routine Maintenance

A few years ago, we purchased a new MTD Yard Machines 4.5HP 21" wide-cutting lawn mower, to replace the decade-plus old Honda that my Dad gave us for a housewarming present. Even though it was about the cheapest gas mower The Home Depot had, it came with a Briggs & Stratton engine and all-metal construction.

I cleaned the air filter, maybe twice, and changed the oil once, at the recommended interval following a break-in period. It was no surprise when, recently, it started running poorly, then surging, then not running at all.

After:
  • Scraping the gunk off the air filter element and rinsing it with gasoline (wear gloves, it makes your skin stink for days)
  • Changing the BLACK oil out of the crankcase for some fresh Mobil1 (I rotated the engine manually, and the difference in internal friction was large)
  • Cleaning the heavily-fouled spark plug, including the rusty contact
  • Cleaning the matching rust out of the spark plug wire contact and spooging it up with some vaseline (a.k.a. dielectric tune-up grease)
  • Installing some new bolts to replace the ones that used to be holding the top cover and gas tank on, which literally rattled loose somewhere in the yard
  • Wrapping several layers of black vinyl electrical tape over the slits in the spark plug wire from the top cover cutting into it
  • and Cleaning several years of schmutz off of the stuff normally concealed by the cover
  • Pulling the cord several times to get the gasoline out, that was drawn in by rotating the engine by hand

    . . . it runs great, now! Thanks to Jesus for letting me be a 'handy' man.
  • No comments: