Had a bad run on the mower the past little while. First...a couple months ago, it started back firing and barely would run. Turned out the intake rocker arm mechanism had come loose. tightened that up and adjusted the lash on the valve. It ran for a while and then went down again some weeks later. Bent the push rods. Had to wait nearly three weeks for the parts.

Grass got so tall the neighbor came by to see if I had died. HA! That may not sound like much...a neighbor coming by...but I bet I haven't talked to this neighbor 5 times in ten years. We are perfect neighbors.

I may have spoken about that before...I can't remember. Anyway, talked to a mechanic about what's going on. He said to be sure and check under the cowlings to see if the cooling fins on the cylinder head were clogged with something because it sounded to him like it was overheating. Sure enough, a mouse had built a nest in the cooling fins. So I put the new push rods in and adjusted the lash. Still wasn't running like it should. So I deduced, after much investigation, that the coil might have overheated as well. Got new coil after waiting another couple of weeks. Mower was running well enough to be cutting grass during the time of coil waiting...therefore, staving off any inquiring as to my possible premature demise.

Put coil in set the air gap. Checked the air gap on the other coil...it was way off. In the process I found I had adjusted the vale lash incorrectly so I readjusted them, again.

Puuurrrring motor. I can barely hear the motor running over the whirring of the blades. Oh, I got new blades as well. Now...I can mow at 13 mph, again, where the yard is smooth enough to do that...and am laying down one pretty asssed cut. That makes me happy! Happy, happy, happy. Have I ever said I love a freshly mowed lawn. hahaha

Like most things these days...these new motors aint your daddies old Briggs and Stratton. Well, part of that could be because it's a Kawasaki engine.