The lawn mower finally died. We moved into our home on Cherokee Avenue on
Feb 2, 1986. We had brought a nice manual push mower from Utah when we moved
here. I used that to cut the grass, but the ground isn't very smooth and it
was quite the job. Our neighbors behind us bought a new power mower and gave
us their old one, for which we were very grateful. We used that mower for years
and years. I replaced the blade on it a couple of times and the spark plug
maybe once. I think I also replaced the air filter once. The pull start broke
a few years back so I drilled out the rivets, fixed the line, and put it back
with my pop rivet gun. A few years back the neighbor's "new" lawn mower died
and they ended up borrowing ours, the one they had given us in 1986. They did
that for several weeks until they replaced theirs again. So, finally, after
more than 25 years of use the lawn mower died. Phillip was cutting the gras
on this day when the mower really started to shake and vibrate. He got a little
worried and was standing way back and leaning over. He turned the corner and
started walking when all of a sudden a piece of the engine went flying off.
He jumped back in alarm and the lawn mower died. He found the piece of the
engine wall that had been blown off. If you look carefully at these pictures
you can see the piston arm hanging out the hole. I don't know the name for
the part, but the end clamp broke off. I took the dead mower to the dump on July 24th. I got it there with no problems right until I took it out of the van to carry it over to the metal scrap dumpster. I must have tilted the mower at an angle. I felt something warm and wet on my leg. Looking down I realized that oil from the engine had poured out of the hole in the side of the engine and run down my shirt and pant leg and onto my right shoe. Fortunately I was wearing really grungy clothing as I had been hauling construction debris from the basement bathroom project to the dump that morning. I threw all the clothing away when I got home. |
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