Show me your mowers!

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Hokiefyd, this one is for you. If you've got pics of your mower's, either past or present, please post them. Tell us anything you can about them, even if theres a story behind how you got it, I'd love to hear it. Doesn't matter if its a push mower, commercial walk behind, or a lawn tractor.

Heres my current mower...
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Its a silver series LawnBoy with the techumseh 4stroke.
 
Just to add, it was given to me by a friend of mine when we bought our first house a couple years ago. My buddy was not much for maintnance. I changed oil before I used it and got maybe a tablespoon of oil out of it. The blade wasn't in any better shape, the cutting edge was just as flat as the back edge. All is good now. I ran Pennzoil 30wt in it the first summer and Defy 5w-30 last summer. Its got a few slow oil leaks, so i think i'm going to experiment with different high mileage oils to see if the leaks subside before actually repairing them. Its not the greatest mower, clogs easily when the grass is damp, and its a little underpowered, but I do like how light and manuverable it is. I've been towing around with the idea of getting a rear bagging kit for it off of Amazon. I've heard mixed reviews, but I don't get to mow as often as I should and I'm tired of dead grass laying in my yard after I cut it.

I've also hopefully got a restoration project in the future. My dad left me his 2stroke LawnBoy rear bagger before he passed away a couple years ago. Its in rough shape, hasn't been used in about 8years. He bought it brand new back in 84 after they built their house. My mom has pics of me following behind him with my little fisher price mower when I was about 4 or 5. I remember I couldn't wait to mow the yard. That was the mower I started out with and wouldn't give it up for the world. Its sitting out in my moms shed right now, so as soon as I can get out there, I will take picks of it and post them.
 
Wow that brought back memories. My dad had a lawn boy and I took over doing the lawn when I was like 8 . Our yard was clearly too big for a self propelled but... All I remember is the bag was like canvas and was on the side.
 
Your L-B is very similar to my 10330. Here's its story:

I found this lawn mower in the neighborhood on a walk with the family one night. It was obviously left for dead. It was on an un-mowed empty lot. One of the front wheel adjusters was jammed, making the whole unit set uneven. The intake manifold was loose on the cylinder head; the engine couldn't have run. The self-propelled cable was so out of adjustment that it wasn't self-propelled. And the winning factor -- the blade was sharpened on the TRAILING edge of the blade. This mower couldn't have cut through butter, let alone a lawn of grass.

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The 10330 came with a Tecumseh LEV100 4-stroke engine, of 4.5 hp. It sort of ran after I fixed many of the issues above. It ran real lean, though. It ran VERY HOT, and tried to overspeed. I only let it run for about 30 seconds before turning it off. No bother, I had better plans for this mower.

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I bought my Sears Craftsman mower back in 2004 mostly for the Honda GCV160 engine it had. I knew the deck was only mediocre quality, but I wanted to try the Honda engine. It's really a super engine, but since my Honda HR215SXA (bought used in 2005) has such an excellent deck with a great commercial engine, I never used the Craftsman anymore.

I had initially thought about painting the Lawn-Boy a "gunmetal" grey, like the Craftsman. Sears calls it "Storm Grey". It's a pretty combination, with the silver aluminum of the engine and red/maroon engine shroud/fuel tank. But after cleaning up this L-B, the bright green was SO lustrous, and in such good shape under the dirt and grime that was on there, I couldn't stand to change the color.

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So I took the Tecumseh off and put it on the workbench. The mounting bolt pattern is the same between the Honda and Tecumseh engine. Both engines are also "fixed throttle" engines, using only the governor for speed control, so there are no throttle cable issues. The operator presence bail (flywheel brake) connects to the engine in slightly different ways, but it still worked.

Comparing the engines side by side, they look close enough in dimension to be swappable.

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The Honda's crankshaft is a bit shorter, but the Craftsman blade adaptor adds an inch or so of length, so the actual hanging "depth" of the two blades is essentially identical. The Honda's drive pulley uses a slightly thinner belt than the Lawn-Boy, but it works.

Here are some initial photos of the Honda engine test-fit on the 10330 deck.

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The photograph above is standing in front of the deck, with the rear wheels at the top of the picture. The Honda engine uses the same three bolt holes as the Tecumseh did on the 10330 deck. The Honda block actually has a 4th mounting hole, but it was not used on the Craftsman mower. It is in the same general location as the hole in the 4:00 position on the 10330 deck as photographed above, but does not line up directly.

Because some aluminum thread material was lost from the Honda block when I removed the three mounting bolts, I went ahead and purchased (3) 5/16-18 x 2" cap bolts with locking washers and nuts to mount the Honda block to the L-B deck. The Honda and Tecumseh both used the same length/thread mounting bolt (3/8x16 x 1"). The 5/16" bolts are just thin enough to clear the threads in the engine block to use as thru-bolts.

So...here's Kermit.

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And with the rest of the mower family...

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I'll write about the other machines in a little bit.
 
Craftsman 17 HP Kohler, 42" deck, hydrostatic drive. Picked it up off some guy on Craigslist for $150. He thought something was wrong with the transmission, but he just had the lever pulled out that disengages the hydrostatic drive so you can roll it around by hand.
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Hokiefyd, that's awesome! That's the kind of stuff I was hoping to see. I was going to start a thread for lawn boys only, but figured we wouldn't get many posts. Your rear bagger lawn boy reminds me of my dads, but his handle bars came straight up, they didn't have that bend, and his engine cover was slightly different. I'll get pics of it as soon as I can. I think I was about 10 when I started mowing with it. Still love mowing today, it's the one time I get some "me time" with out the wife or kids bothering me. Can you still get the handle bars and bags for those? The chrome, or what ever they used on them is all pitted and rusty, and i'm sitter the mice have long since wreaked havoc on the bag.
 
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Tig1, what is the difference between the red craftsman tractors and the black ones? Is one a better model than the other? I was at Sears the other week but didn't have time to really check them out
 
The red ones are their better line. When I bought mine I compared them and found the red machines have heavier steel in the bodies, more HP with a pressurized lub system. The differance is noticeable.
 
The other Lawn-Boy in the family photo in my first post is a 1987 model 8157 and it, too, has a unique story.

My parents are full-time RVers, retired from the US Navy, out there living it up. They were sitting at a campfire with some friends one night and at some point, the husband of their friend-couple said that he has an old Lawn-Boy mower that he needs to get rid of. My mom said, “oh my son loves Lawn-Boy mowers,” and they offered to give it to me if I’d give it a good home. It was shipped from Florida to North Carolina via FedEx, and now is a proud member of my small mower collection.

But why ship a lawn mower from Florida? This wasn’t simply an old Lawn-Boy. It was a new-in-box mower that had never been run, and had never even had fuel. The man’s father won this mower in a contest back in 1986. You see, his father started a lawn mower dealership in Kansas after WWII, and they sold Lawn-Boys (they also sent me a cool metal sign). He ran that dealership through the late 1980s when he retired. But in 1986, Lawn-Boy had a contest; whomever had the oldest running Lawn-Boy would win a new Lawn-Boy mower. This man’s dad had the oldest running Lawn-Boy at that time, and this very mower was the one he won in that contest. He never used it because he had a larger lawn and mowed it with a lawn tractor.

The father passed away a number of years ago and his son (my folks’ friend) had the mower since. So they said that if it goes to a good home, I could have it. When I got it, I debated for a few weeks what to do with it…should I store it mothballed or should I use it? I decided not to let it just sit and rot…I’d use it. So I did, and I have. There were some initial casualties from age and rot…the nipple on the bottom of the fuel tank was broken, and the throttle cable snapped in its sheath the first time I tried to move it. With those items fixed, it runs like a dream. Unlike most Lawn-Boy F engines, the muffler on this one is top-side because of the blade clutch underneath. Yes, you release the operator presence bail and the blade stops but not the engine (you turn off the engine with a key switch on the handle).

The mower is from their “Suburban” line…then a new concept and not a very long-lived one. Unlike most Lawn-Boys with their staggered wheel decks, this is a “four-square” model. The handle goes straight back and then straight up with a severe bend in it. You push the back of the handle forward to engage the self-propel mechanism. No levers to pull…you simply push forward on the handle; it pulls on a cable that pulls on the clutch fork in the transmission. It’s a very early implementation of “Personal Pace” systems you see today…the harder you push the handle forward, the faster the mower moves. The cable adjustment is tricky…it varies based on the weight of the mower (grass in the bag). It’d be more consistent if I bought the mulch plug for it and mulched with it.

But it’s a great old mower, and a neat time piece. It’s no longer “virgin” in that I’ve gassed it and used it. It’s not all that easy to use turning corners…it’s best done in a straight line. As such, I have to be in the right mood to use it, but it’s a treat to use when I do use it.

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I'm jealous:) I really like that sign too. The guy down at the end of the alley behind our house has a lawn boy just like the one in that picture. I've been tempted to walk down and introduce myself to him and ask about it, but i'm afraid he'd think i'm some kind of nut;-) but back to your 8157, I thought that thing was unusually clean. That's a really neat story. My dads was similar, but wasn't self propelled, no blade brake, I had a piece of rope tired around the handle to keep it running while I emptied the bag,then slid it down the handle when I wanted to shut it off.
 
The Craftsman tractor we bought last summer.

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I don't have any of the others right now I'll try to get some in the next few days if the weather is nice enough.
 
1991 Wheel Horse 312-8. It has the Kohler Magnum 12 hp engine, 8 speed manual transmission, 37" wide cutting deck, and a twin bagger (not pictured). It has about 820 hrs on it. I love this machine. These pics were taken in November, when I was winterizing it. She's all cleaned up:

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I also have a Craftsman 21" push mower with a Honda GCV160 engine. I use this for going around the edges of the yard, in the areas that are hard to reach with the tractor. I have a bagger for this as well. This mower is about 15 years old now.


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Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
The 757.

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8N dedicated bush hog tractor.

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The bush hog.

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That's a beautiful old Ford tractor you got there pop. Don't see many of them around anymore sadly.
 
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Do I have the worst mower here? The Sears on the left (PIECE OF JUNK!) and the red Murray got sent to the scrap yard and trimmer got stolen. Not sure on the brand name but's pretty wore out. It's a 98 and grandpa bought it in 00 at a garage sale. He used it to mow 20 yards every 2 weeks for about 2 years when I got it.

The 6.5hp Briggs runs excellent, starts on the second pull used to be the first till last year. Hasn't had any tread on the front tires for 10 years. Self-propelled gave out last year... the best thing about it! Still easy to push. Deck is weak think I'm starting to give up on it.
 
Originally Posted By: Nick R


That's a beautiful old Ford tractor you got there pop. Don't see many of them around anymore sadly.


Thanks-that's one of 4 that I own. Two are show tractors, the other two are working tractors.

That being said, N's were one of the highest production tractors ever. There are a large number still around and in use. The difference between N's and most other vintage tractors is their versatility-they're a pretty common acreage tractor and there are a lot of them around.
 
Originally Posted By: Pop_Rivit
Originally Posted By: Nick R


That's a beautiful old Ford tractor you got there pop. Don't see many of them around anymore sadly.


Thanks-that's one of 4 that I own. Two are show tractors, the other two are working tractors.

That being said, N's were one of the highest production tractors ever. There are a large number still around and in use. The difference between N's and most other vintage tractors is their versatility-they're a pretty common acreage tractor and there are a lot of them around.

When I was a kid, our neighbor used to have one of those and would come around and plow everyone drive way in the winter time for a few bucks. We were always happy to see him. As a kid, I always thought it was so cool looking with that grill and the two tone paint. I'd like to find one some day with the flat head v8 conversion
 
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