Lately I have been welding a plug in the end of the lower handle pieces that bolt to the chassis with the single bolt. What happens is people keep tightening the bolt to try and give the handles a bit of rigidity and it ends up squashing the handle and just makes it worse, so they tighten it again and again. I am only putting in a piece about a half inch long and that allows it to sit under the cover plate. I have done probably 10 mowers like this but I haven't seen any long term results to see if this is going to solve one of the handle problems. Anybody else tried something like this?
Hi Norm, clearly you have too much time on your hands, and single handedly trying to rectify Victa's design flaws one mower at a time. Hope you're keeping well and we'll talk soon.
There you go MF, a bit of 19mm bar in the end and the ends will never crush again. BT, not too much time on my hands just as you say trying to fix problems Victa left behind. I guess it was all part of their planed obsolescence,the motors wouldn't fail so they had to make other components force people to replace their mower
I've never tried the steel plug in the end of these Victa mowers but have used solid round steel where the handle mounts to the base on vintage alloy base mowers.
With the Victa ,I would usually replace if the tubes are too flat or use 2 bits of wood and hammer the tube round again ,then panel beat the top of the deck so there is a nice channel for the tube and always make sure there is the 2 reinforcement plates ,one under the base and the one on top of the tube.
My main problem is I have a limited amount of this bar and even though I only use about 15mm for each plug it soon adds up and I don't want to have to buy a length
Victa have defintely designed these to eventually fail. The first steel bases with the full crank were thicker steel and therefore more rigid but then the sneaks used thinner steel which is when the well known problems started. Mass consumers clearly didn't care.
Ahh, if only victa had kept producing the thumblatch catcher series, they would be in better shape today!
Norm, if you are lopping off victa axle stubs to fit rover wheels, then what about if you used a bit of round tube around the axle stub and put that in the handle- erw tube must be cheaper than solid steel rod
Tyler, that is a good suggestion to use what will go to waste.
Norm, I think I finally figured what you have done. You put in a piece of tight fitting round solid steel in the hollow of the lower handle tube to stop the torque from the nut being able to collapse it.
Originally Posted by bigted
Hi Norm, clearly you have too much time on your hands, and single handedly trying to rectify Victa's design flaws one mower at a time. Hope you're keeping well and we'll talk soon.
Norm is just doing his thing finding ways to extend the life of these things. This could benefit many people down the line. The weakness with two stroke Powertorque mowers is they only fit properly on their own frames and they wear out at a greater rate. People like Norm and Carbymaster are contributing to helping to keep remaining Victa mowers viable where they would otherwise be replaced through attrition. Good to know be uses his spare time this way rather than hitting a ball into a hole and not gaining much fitness from it.
Last edited by Mowerfreak; 28/02/2209:49 PM.
Ahh, if only victa had kept producing the thumblatch catcher series, they would be in better shape today!
Hi Tyler and MF, I did a few with a piece of heavy tube I had here but I don't have much of that left either. Not sure what it was, might have been a bit of half inch pipe I had skimmed down a bit for some reason, not sure. At one stage I did think about plugging them with a piece of dowl but not sure how it would last
