Today I acquired...........

[waddycall]

I lapped the blades to the bed knife on my mower a couple of weeks ago using some valve grinding paste and turning the blade backwards with a drill. They’ve come up like new and cut like sharp scissors along the full length. Will be worth doing something similar once you’ve got it running.

 

[Hopefuldave]

I lapped the blades to the bed knife on my mower a couple of weeks ago using some valve grinding paste and turning the blade backwards with a drill. They’ve come up like new and cut like sharp scissors along the full length. Will be worth doing something similar once you’ve got it running.

I've done that with emery glued to the knife, worked up to 600 grit and got them scary sharp!

Dave H. (the other one)

 

[angellonewolf]

better try seeing spark on a night time i do mine a lot of time to see if there is spark

or get a spark tester there only £4 and help greatly but i do know what you mean its hard to pull the cord and see the spark

 

[Seadog]

Nonsense, how is an ornithological reference lowering the tone.
I mean it must be obvious what he was referring to, seeing as he is a seafaring type (well a WAFI anyway ) and the Booby is a Sea bird.

Thank you Robin ( I think ). I've only ever seen them once, on Mustique, many, many years ago.

 

[slim_boy_fat]

I did a refurb on one a while back with pics/report. Can't be bothered to do a search now for it , but it ought to be on here somewhere.

 

[Richiew]

better try seeing spark on a night time i do mine a lot of time to see if there is spark

or get a spark tester there only £4 and help greatly but i do know what you mean its hard to pull the cord and see the spark

If your eyesight's bad you can always go by feel

 

[Pigeon_Droppings2]

eah, it was just to generate a spark. I couldn't spot one just using the pull cord. I know that if the engine takes when you have a drill attached it all gets a bit scary..

I was doing exactly the same on a petrol strimmer over the weekend...had to turn the lights off the see the spark.

I reckon this mower deserves it's own thread and the full treatment ....my strimmer was a cheap B&Q jobbie....spent a whole day stripping and cleaning the carb but it refused to start (unless I poured fuel into the spark plug hole directly). I was searching for a carb repair kit.....turns out a replacement carb is £8

 

[Richiew]

I'll stick a thread up when my replacement bits arrive. They are due on Wednesday so I hope they arrive before the bank holiday weekend when the post stops. It will just be a "getting it going" treatment. The mower won't be getting a Spencer427 rebuild. I could try some blade sharpening in the meantime.

 

[angellonewolf]

I was doing exactly the same on a petrol strimmer over the weekend...had to turn the lights off the see the spark.

I reckon this mower deserves it's own thread and the full treatment ....my strimmer was a cheap B&Q jobbie....spent a whole day stripping and cleaning the carb but it refused to start (unless I poured fuel into the spark plug hole directly). I was searching for a carb repair kit.....turns out a replacement carb is £8

^^^^your very lucky near all the cheapy strimmers i see the parts outway the strimmer working with a new carb even a carb kits inc postage comes to £20

 

[JEZGUZ]

When I was a kid, about 10 I suppose, my dad got hold of an old mower. It had a kickstart and a Royal Enfield two stroke engine, anyway he was trying to get it started and I was mooching around being not very helpful I suppose, so he said "hold onto this". "This" turned out to be the HT lead as I soon discovered, he kicked it over and I found out that the flywheel magneto was indeed working After I had stopped leaping around he said "It'll be the plug then" . How I laughed

 

[angellonewolf]

that never worked on the kids they know me to well


but years ago i did get my otherhalf with i was working on the ceiling light had it down and said to the other half its dark in here put the light on for me she did switch try switching the lighton and off for quite a few times be for i fell on the floor laughing before she realised what she was doing as i had the light fitting on the floor by the side of her

 

[Seadog]

It had a kickstart and a Royal Enfield two stroke engine

My first bike was a Royal Enfield two stroke. It was an Enfield Ensign Prince with a bloody great big Avon fairing about an inch thick. I'm sure it weighed more than the bike. I also thought that it was a standard fitting. Gutless £10 worth, but at least it got me on the road to motorcycling cheaply, at the age of 16. Much to my father's disgust

 

[Pigeon_Droppings2]

^^^^your very lucky near all the cheapy strimmers i see the parts outway the strimmer working with a new carb even a carb kits inc postage comes to £20

Hope so....it looked the same on the ebay listing....hope it fits.....worth a punt at that kind of money. My gut feeling is that the needle/tube setup has worn out....the tube is plastic

 

[angellonewolf]

ive bought a few copy carbs as long as you buy and cheak the measurements most will work not as nice as a carb refurb but if it gets you out of a hole for a few months /year £8 is cheap

 

[Pigeon_Droppings2]

Yea...I kind of just looked at the pictures and figured it mostly looked the same ...hopefully I'll get away with it fingers crossed.

 

[Dr.Al]

And you hit the functions after the number.

I go slightly even further than that as I somehow managed to program my brain many years ago to use reverse polish calculators. These always involve the function after the number, not just for sin, cos etc. For example to add 6 and 4 together you press "6 ENTER 4 +" rather than "6 + 4 =" (i.e. the "plus" function comes after the number). For long and complicated calculations reverse polish involves a lot less keypresses. For cost form type calculations (price and quantity on lots of rows), it gives you all the intermediate values (cost × quantity) as well as the end result, all in one go.

It does mean I now can't go back and use a "normal" calculator as my brain is just wired the wrong way for it.

My calculator is one of these and is still going after 25 years and in use most days:

 

[slim_boy_fat]

I'm old enough to remember when no-one had calculators....

 

[Seadog]

I still have my British Thornton slide rule somewhere. I never did work out how to use it very well

 

[Hood]

I still have my British Thornton slide rule somewhere. I never did work out how to use it very well

Talking of slide rules, I have this, instructions are on the back but not likely to ever need

 

[Country Joe]

All this slide-rule stuff - it'll be logarithms, next!
CJ