I have started with the SB and took the sprocket housing cover off today and cleaned it out, all looks good in there.
I took the briggs motor off and the clutch came off with it, so my father-in-law helped me with a massive gear puller get it off the drive shaft from the motor. All good. We changed the oil and spark plug and drained the crud out of the petrol tank. Only bad part is that the cork inside the clutch was covered in grease and the bearing is done. It spins but makes noise and does not spin very well on your finger, so will order a new one. This is called a clutch thrust bearing? I might as well order new cork as well. The engine otherwise looks great, all the seals seem to be in tact and in very good condition, so we're not touching the exhaust nor the head bolts, just leave them all be unless there's an issue.
Question: Do I need any sort of adhesive or grease inside the clutch? Or is it meant to be dry as in the outdoor king video on youtube?
I have to order new air filters, the paper one I can get at bunnings, but cheaper online and also coming with the pre-filter foam pad, as that disintegrated in my fingers - quite brittle with age as expected.
Steel wooled the handle bars, coming up very nicely I must say!
Tomorrow going to remove the chains and pull the reel drive sprocket and disassemble and remove everything basically. Have a tin of primer and another of green hammer tone, an engine enamel red for the motor, and some orange enamel for the reel. The reel and bed knife are dirty but seem ok.
Lots of sanding to remove surface rust to come.
Getting excited, hitting it with degreaser already reveals how well it has actually aged. Not many issues under there. One weld to tack up on one blade, one is slightly bent, but all in all its not too bad, it still sliced paper in a few places in its current terrible shape.
Im a little concerned about the adjuster screws being wound all the way down on each side, but after removal cleaning/painting and refitting, I will see what happens. At this stage will probably back-lap the blades and see what this produces before I worry about a new reel purchase or professional sharpening if I can even find anywhere that will do it for less than the cost of a new one.
Im getting very excited, there's some hard work left in it but should come up trumps. May bench test the briggs and stratton tomorrow on idle to see how easily/poorly she fires up. Must not have been started in about 15 years.
Also, I gather it was replacing the original Kirby, but the model no. off the Briggs and Stratton engine are as follows:
Model: 82232 Type: 4016 01 Code: 90071803
It uses a Champion RJ19LM, or NGK 5798.
I have attached the PDF I found for the engine part numbers in case it assists someone else one day...
