Hi guys,
A few weeks ago, I did a dumb thing with my 2 year old HRR216VKC. I have a weedy area next to my yard and got the urge to try and mow it under control a bit. I immediately hit a weed that I realized after had a woody stalk that was an inch thick! The lawnmower immediately lost power, sputtered, but kept going, with a lot of sputtering and backfiring. Eventually it seemed to get it's timing back and ran normally, although I could swear the RPMs were lower than before. I decided to turn it off and do some research.
I've never fixed a lawnmower before but a few pages I read suggested I had probably sheared the flywheel key. I left the lawnmower for a few days and eventually went and got some tools to try and get the flywheel off and have a look. After 3 trips to the store, a broken wal-mart strap wrench and a lot of cursing, I still haven't been able to get the bolt loosened. Lots of people have mentioned using a crowbar or something in between the posts on the flywheel to brace it while I push the ratchet the other way, but this flywheel has a plastic fan assembly on top (secured with the same bolt) and there is nowhere to get leverage without damaging that fan assembly. The only thing I can think of is to use a strap wrench to hold the whole flywheel in place but I haven't made any progress, even with 2 people!
My father-in-law partially convinced me that there may not be an actual problem, since it still runs. So this weekend I tried mowing the lawn again. I got about 3 minutes in before the mower died completely and refused to start again. So that sucks, it's now not running.
I'm hoping someone here has a good suggestion for how to get this off. I'm a very inexperienced guy when it comes to mechanical issues, but I like learning new stuff. It always seems to me that the hardest part of any mechanical project is loosening tightened objects! Maybe I'm missing something here, are these bolts threaded backwards (ie do I need to turn clockwise to loosen instead of counterclockwise)? Maybe I'm going after the wrong problem? Help!
A few weeks ago, I did a dumb thing with my 2 year old HRR216VKC. I have a weedy area next to my yard and got the urge to try and mow it under control a bit. I immediately hit a weed that I realized after had a woody stalk that was an inch thick! The lawnmower immediately lost power, sputtered, but kept going, with a lot of sputtering and backfiring. Eventually it seemed to get it's timing back and ran normally, although I could swear the RPMs were lower than before. I decided to turn it off and do some research.
I've never fixed a lawnmower before but a few pages I read suggested I had probably sheared the flywheel key. I left the lawnmower for a few days and eventually went and got some tools to try and get the flywheel off and have a look. After 3 trips to the store, a broken wal-mart strap wrench and a lot of cursing, I still haven't been able to get the bolt loosened. Lots of people have mentioned using a crowbar or something in between the posts on the flywheel to brace it while I push the ratchet the other way, but this flywheel has a plastic fan assembly on top (secured with the same bolt) and there is nowhere to get leverage without damaging that fan assembly. The only thing I can think of is to use a strap wrench to hold the whole flywheel in place but I haven't made any progress, even with 2 people!
My father-in-law partially convinced me that there may not be an actual problem, since it still runs. So this weekend I tried mowing the lawn again. I got about 3 minutes in before the mower died completely and refused to start again. So that sucks, it's now not running.
I'm hoping someone here has a good suggestion for how to get this off. I'm a very inexperienced guy when it comes to mechanical issues, but I like learning new stuff. It always seems to me that the hardest part of any mechanical project is loosening tightened objects! Maybe I'm missing something here, are these bolts threaded backwards (ie do I need to turn clockwise to loosen instead of counterclockwise)? Maybe I'm going after the wrong problem? Help!