This story began with the family lawn mower back in the late 90's, an aged Morrison with the Briggs 148cc 3.5hp engine. Dad bought this second hand when he bought the house after I was born in 1986. Dad was never into gardening, so a lawn mower was a necessary evil to him. As such, when something broke, he's butcher it back together with whatever he found lying around. When the deck height adjuster broke, he welded in back together and froze the height in place. When the muffler rusted out around the bolts, he just looped a piece of wire to hold it on. When the poor engine started blowing plumes of smoke from worn piston rings, you'd think he would have gone and bought a new mower, but no, both my father and I stripped and rebuilt it. This is the genesis of my love of small engines!
With me getting more and more interested in this sort of thing, and my desire to mow lawns for pocket money, I hounded my parents to buy me a lawn mower for my 14th birthday back in December 2001. While most teenage boys would be asking for a bike or a computer game, I wanted a lawn mower! I rode my bike all over town looking at what I wanted, the internet was not a thing in the household in those days. I decided I wanted a Victa, because that’s what my grandfather had, and I wanted the Briggs and Stratton Sprint 375 engine. Don’t ask me why I wanted that combination, I guess it made sense to my 14 year old brain at the time, probably because it was the modern version of what was on the Morrison. I remember on dealer trying to upsell me, but no, I wanted what I wanted! I even have the brochures I collected at the time.
This mower went on to make me money on the weekends cutting lawns, then helped me start my garden maintenance business after I left high school. Over those early years, I was working this mower hard. I landed a big job mowing for one of the richest families in Australia, thinking I'd have to get something bigger because it made me look lame. Apparently, they fired the last guy because his huge ride-on just make a huge mess and that my little mower was just fine with them. The amount of income this little red Corvette generated is immeasurable! I eventually got so busy that I decided I needed to buy something a little bigger and more powerful, but I decided to keep the Corvette.
From day one, I looked after this mower fastidiously, changing the oil, cleaning and re-oiling the air filter, spark plugs, blades, regular cleaning..................in other words, I took care of what was making me money. And just because it was gift, I didn't take it for granted. Despite the amount of work it has done, the Corvette has been very reliable, a testament to regular maintenance. It's had a replacement throttle control, the deck baffle came off with a thud at one point and needed to be refitted, and I've put a set of front axle bushes and new clips on it. Until recently, that's all its needed.
The Corvette's replacement a few years later was another Victa, the then new Razor with the funky handlebars and the Briggs & Stratton Quantum XTS60. In summer, that integrated drink bottle holder was pure generous, as was the handlebars as they were very ergonomic. I wish they still offered something like that. The Victa Razor was actually one of THE best mowers I have ever had, I'm actually annoyed I traded it on one of the worst, a Honda HRU197. I've been on the hunt for another one of these Razor's, ideally with the 2-Stroke on it.
Even after upgrading to bigger and better machines, I would often take this mower with me, it's just so light and easy to use. It owes me nothing, and so I have kept it as a reminder of my youth. I haven't taken it on a job for a very long time now, but it gets the occasional run on my own lawns.
As mentioned in the first post, the little red Corvette has done a lot of work over its 24-year life. In recent years, I've attended to a couple of more involved maintenance items over and above the usual oil changes and blades.
The first of which was to refresh the carburetor. While the engine was starting and running, it was lacking throttle response and would stumble a little going from idle to full throttle, while also having the occasional mild surge. To get 22-years out of the original diaphragm is quite remarkable, I assume from regular use keeping it pliable. When we result the Morrison's engine, the carb wasn't touched, so this would be my first attempt at a carburetor repair.
So, I ordered a carb kit, and new governor springs for good measure.
To gain access, the air filter was removed and the throttle disconnected, followed by breather tube. The two bolts holding the tank in place were then removed and the whole carb/tank assembly is wiggled away from the intake manifold.
While not necessary, I also removed the blower shroud to inspect and clean, the first time off the engine since it was made.
On the bench, I started work removing the carb from the tank and getting everything clean.
The old diaphragm was ok, but clearly aged. The new parts were then installed.
I then installed the new governor springs and inspected the intake manifold as these have a habit of coming loose over time. The refurbished carb and tank were then reinstalled.
An oil change and a little clean, I fired it up and once again had a stable running engine!
I hope you can tell the sentimental tone so far, because that is how I feel about this mower. In no way is this mower worth much, or even worth keeping. But what it represents is worth more to me than its monetary or practical value. I say this because the following project didn't make financial sense, rather its something I wanted to do.
Having worked this mower so hard for so long, as you can imagine, the engine had become quite smokey, both on start-up and whilst running. Considering the regular maintenance the engine always got, this smoking was not from a lack of oil or neglected oil changes. I simply wore it out! So with that in mind, I made sure to keep it topped up with fresh oil. The plan at some stage was to rebuild the engine, time permitting.
So, I had been planning this project for nearly a year, and I'd had the parts sitting in the cabinet for months. With me taking some long-service-leave, I finally had the time to get stuck into this job. Even though I had done this before with my father, that was something like 25-years ago. I'm not going to lie, I was quite apprehensive about getting stuck into this job. Actually, buying the parts was kinda a "no excuses now" type of deal.
First up, I disconnected the throttle cable. On this era of Victa, the Briggs & Stratton engines had an alloy adaptor ring that sits between the deck and sump. This helps space the crankshaft to the correct height and accounts for the different mounting points between Briggs and the Victa engine. Removing the blade carrier first, you then remove the three bolts that secure the engine and adaptor ring to the chassis.
I then drained the oil and fuel from the engine.
The next step was to remove the blade boss from the crankshaft. There are two ways to remove these, by hammer or puller. However, I don't have a vice or anvil to support the crankshaft to "shock" it off via hammer. So, I needed a puller. I had actually planned on buying a puller, but for some reason didn't bother. So, off I went to Total Tools to buy a puller. After consulting Youtube, the blade boss slid off the crankshaft with ease. I have said this before, but Youtube is such a brilliant resource for learning.
At this point, I apologize for the lack of images, I was "in the zone".
From here, things went relatively smooth. After cleaning off the 24 years' worth of crud from the underside of the engine, I then cracked the sump bolts loose. I then lightly tapped on the sump, which slid easily down and stopped. So, I tapped the sump back in place and lightly scuffed the crankshaft where the blade boss had been, the sump then slid off with ease. I then removed the cylinder head, making sure to keep track of the bolt locations. Next, I removed the oil slinger, cracked the conrod bolts, tapped off the cap, then pushed the piston out of the cylinder.
It was then clean, clean, clean. Starting with the piston, I removed the old rings, then started removing the buildup of carbon on the crown. Because of the oil consumption, there was also significant carbon deposits on the cylinder head and valves, the crankcase and sump were surprisingly clean, a testament to frequent oil changes. I then removed the old gasket material off the head and sump mating surfaces, followed by cleaning everything with kerosene and set aside ready for reassembly.
The piston has some very mild scoring, but they were smooth and didn't catch a fingernail, the cylinder likewise. There was plenty of blowby on the piston though. To be honest, I wasn't expecting anything more than that, the engine always had plenty of fresh oil in it, so the wear on the piston and cylinder is from use, not abuse.
NOTE - I didn't fully disassemble this engine, the exercise was simply to replace the rings and see what that got me. Apart from burning oil, the engine started easily and was strong running. Despite working it to near death, it was always well maintained with fresh oil and clean air filters. If you can imagine a teenage DFB, well I looked after that engine like one of my cars today! Also, after much reading and viewing, I was getting conflicting information as to if you can hone the bore on these aluminum cylinders. In the end, considering the condition of the bore, I decided to skip the honing step and just install new piston rings. Therefore, I didn't feel the need to completely strip the engine to do this.
The following day, I got stuck into the reassembly.
To be clear here, these engines were basically a throw-away item, rebuilding one is not an economically viable proposition. So, unless you are sentimental like me and have the time and desire to do so, then you would be better served replacing the engine with a long block for as little as $250. In my case, I used about $70 in parts, a $40 puller, a $60 ring compressor and $20 for ring pliers, so yeah, an extra $60 would have bought me a new engine from an online engine retailer.
Parts for this partial rebuild involved piston rings, and the associated gaskets and seals. I decided to use OEM Briggs & Stratton rings, then aftermarket head and sump gaskets, and a new Stens lower crank seal.
The first thing I did was to remove the camshaft, lifters and crankshaft cam gear out of the crankcase to provide better access for reassembly. I didn't want to mess with these, but they simply lift out so easily that there was no reason not to. I then cleaned and inspected these parts and set them aside for later. The lifters and (plastic) cam had minimal wear, likewise the conrod and conrod end cap, remarkable considering how much work this engine has done. I then measured old and new rings in the bore to verify that yeah, the old ones were toast.
After giving everything a final clean down, including the cylinder and crankcase, I started by installing the new oil seal on the sump. I then lubed the piston and installed the piston rings, the hardest being the two-piece lower oil control ring which fought me a little. After each ring went on, I staggered the end gaps and clamped it in the ring compressor, which was a little tricky but I got there. Time for everything to go back together!
First up, installing the piston and rod back into the cylinder. After applying oil to the cylinder, the conrod big end and more on the piston, I lined up the piston and ring compressor with the cylinder, then gently tapped the piston down with the handle of my hammer. I don't know if it's just me, but I love the tap-tap-tap sound of a piston being installed into a cylinder. The conrod was then lined up with the crankshaft, both with plenty of assembly oil. I then installed the end cap, again well oiled, then torqued in increments to 11.3 Nm. A quick spin over verified my work.
Next, re-installing the lifters, oiled for good measure. These simply slide back into place, the oiled camshaft then drops into its recess in the block, holding the lifters in place. The oiled crankshaft timing gear slides onto its key, making sure to rotate the crank first to align the timing marks on the gear and camshaft. The camshaft driven oil slinger then drops onto the top of the camshaft.
It was then time to start sealing the engine back up. The gasket kit comes with several paper sump gaskets in differing thickness, I just went with the standard 0.015" item. With the gasket lined up and held with the dowels in the block, I then oiled the crankshaft and oil seal and gently tapped the sump back down till it was nicely seated and flush. I then went around re-installing the sump bolts, firstly winding them down until they seated. Working in a cross pattern, the bolts were torqued down in increments to the 10.17 Nm spec, re-checking a few times to make sure it was all down square.
Next, the cylinder head. Using two of the bolts to hold the new gasket in place, I lined the head up with the block and wound the bolts down until they seated. With the rest of the bolts seated, I then torqued them to 16 Nm, again working in a cross pattern and in increments till the spec was achieved. The supporting bracket was then re-secured and the spark plug installed.
Old worn rings, head gasket and oil seal.
Getting the engine back on the mower deck took a little patience to align the three bolts with adaptor plate, deck and sump. I then re-installed the blade boss and blade carrier, then connected the throttle cable. While I tend to run 10W-30 semi-synthetic in most of my 4-stroke mowers, but for break-in and on the older Briggs's engines I like to stay with the recommended mineral SAE30. In particular, I've been using Penrite oils over the last few years.
So, with oil in the sump and fuel in the tank, it was time to fire it up!
Success!
Upon first start up, naturally there was some smoke as the engine burnt off the assembly lube. However, as the engine came up to temperature, the smoking cleared, later verified with multiple restarts from hot and cold. Apart from solving the smoking habit, the most noticeable result of this project was how much compression the engine now has, evident from the extra effort required to pull the engine over and how much stronger it sounded.
My biggest fear in the lead up to doing this repair was getting everything back together in the right place. But this engine is so bloody simple, that when I stepped back and thought about it yesterday, it's almost impossible to put it back together the wrong way. The piston and rod assembly can only go one way, otherwise you wouldn't have access to the end cap bolts. The camshaft, lifters and timing gear are all recess fit, making it simple to remove and re-install correctly.
As I said earlier, you would never rebuild one of these engines unless its something you really wanted to do, simply because of the throwaway society we live in. And a small engine shop wouldn't want to do it either, the argument being that parts and labor to do so would probably buy you two brand new engines!
But that was not the point here. I wanted to do this for sentimental reasons, but also out of curiosity. As a bonus, I got to learn how to use a puller and piston ring compressor, while also putting my tools to good use. As a learning experience, I would call it a success. But to have also achieved the desired result, as in no more smoking, well that makes me very happy.
(Sorry about the lack of photos for this project. I was covered in oil and filth, which I didn't want all over my camera or phone, and I was also focused on the task at hand.)
While Victa still makes the same 19-inch alloy chassis via the Mustang, it's a shame they abandoned the unconventional handlebar design. As I alluded to earlier, the design was ergonomically superior as it made for easier maneuverability when changing direction or when turning around at the end of the run. The drink bottle holder might have been a gimmick, which was supplied with a Victa branded drink bottle which I still have, but I found it brilliant for when mowing in summer.
I'm not sure what the go is with colouring, I assume the blue versions were for Bunning's and the grey for Victa dealers, mine was purchased from a dealer. I still have the brochure from the time.
One of the best mowers I've had, and I've had far too many over the years. I'd love to find another one, preferably with the VSX160.