This 160 Special has had one or two things done to it over the years: the starter is off a rotomo and the blade carrier is a late model lozenge-shaped one.
It hadn’t run for goodness knows how long so I did some basic checks first. - no insects or obstruction in the intake - no insects or obstruction in exhaust - nothing wrapped around the blades or blade carrier, no cracks, not loose - pulled dried grass from around muffler and flywheel, evicted a few spiders. - looked in fuel tank: bone dry but no rubbish either. Must have drained it before storage.
Took out the spark plug, black as night. Gave it a good clean with a brass brush, bit of wet and dry paper, good squirt off with compressed air. Looked good.
Squirted a bit of two stroke oil into the cylinder and turned it over without spark, compression seemed ok.
Put a bit of fuel in the tank and checked for leaks; nothing!
Turned on the fuel tap and fuel started leaking out the front of the tap - damn. Just as well it’s on my gravel drive. I give if a wiggle, on off, on off, stops leaking. Excellent.
Tickle the g3 carb til see fuel coming out the hole.
Wrap cord around spindle - pull - fires up first go!
I cut grass til it runs out of fuel.
I’m pretty pleased, not bad for a 48 year old mower.
There’s a few things need fixing.
Vibration There’s much more vibration than I remember. I had a pair of leather riggers gloves in my back pocket so I put them on and that helped a bit but I’m wondering if that asymmetrical blade carrier is at fault? The vibration is pretty unpleasant, I certainly wouldn’t hand it to someone else to mow with. It could also be that one or more engine bearings is flogged out, hope not.
Governor? It isn’t maintaining revs in thick grass. It might be that the governor housing is filthy and the governor blade can’t move or the spring is gunked up. I’ll take the cowl off tomorrow and give it a proper clean.
Air filter housing This one is cracked longitudinally down the front. The one I have on my spare mower is also cactus, badly sun crazed and cracked. I see they are no longer available in most spares places. Does anyone know of a source? I could do with two.
Wonky wheels and axels I guess it goes without saying, it needs a full going over. Bushes, spring clips wheel bearings. All of it needs replacing. I am going to see what fits. These look similar to mowers in the domestic range so I hope the standard bits work.
Blades These are not as bad as I thought they were but they should be replaced. One great thing about these machines was that they would really eject the clippings in spring cutting. Then, for other times, you could swap the blades and they’d mulch with the filler piece in. The problem is I’ve forgotten which blades to use. Does anyone have any hints?
All up I’m very pleased it ran, wasn’t expecting it to.
