replace starter?

[rbig]

We have several mowers at our campus. One I worked on today had blades badly damaged.

The other one is totally dead. It has a good battery, so that's not the problem. It acts like the classic bad solenoid situation.

Got to tracing wires today, and found that the positive battery terminal runs to the bottom of the starter. No sign of a solenoid.

Whatis the fix for these type units? New starter???

[o-so-n-so]

Its got to have something to control the power to the starter. The starter is grounded when bolted up. If that hot wire runs from battery to starter with no break in between, the starter would be turning continuously until it burned up or the battery lost charge.

[rbig]

Agreed. Just wonder if they're now putting the solenoid inside the starter cases. There's something, somewhere, that performs the solenoid function.

[Oldtimer]

There is a very good possibility the starter is wired properly. If it is a Kohler engine, the newer starters are wired directly to the battery and the yellow wire from the starter will energize the selenoid.

Oldtimer

[rbig]

Thanks. I'll check it out as soon as I can. I live in Pensacola, so we're going to be catching some weather tomorrow. May not get to it for a few days, but I'll report back.

[rbig]

Well, the solenoid is not inside the starter case. That's the good news. The bad news is I have a very bad feeling it's hidden away up under the center console.

And, this means I'll probably have to pull the deck to even get to the solenoid. Pulling those decks is no fun at all. It's not hard or difficult, just a pain the patootie. Accessing the draft arm pins and disconnecting from the deck drive belt is no fun whatsoever.

I was able to check out the safety switch iin the seat. It's a normally closed switch, and when you take weight off the seat, it opens. Ours is OK.

What I haven't found is the PTO lock out switch. I have a feeling it too is up under the center console, and will require the deck coming out to give me access to check it.

[xcopterdoc]

You guys working on these mowers at the campus need to get some tech manuals. Saves ya lots of heart ache and lost time.

[fixer67]

I told you on Yahoo to try raising the seat and removing the battery and looking under the battery. Have you did that? Post make and model numbers and/or pictures and some one will be able to point you straight to it.

[rbig]

Doing the checks tomorrow. I can narrow it down to either a bad starter or a bad solenoid, I think.

Make is Yardman. Model is 13AS675H302. I'll see if a can get some digi pics.

[fixer67]

That is an old 675 machine. The solenoid is right in front of the seat. Remove the metal plate where the gear shift goes though and the solenoid is right in fornt of the seat. See picture. It is item number 88 in the picture

[rbig]

Lots of progress to report, mainly thanks to the diagram from the manual you posted. Thanks for that.

I was able to go right to the solenoid, fuse, and seat safety switch.

Everything checked out fine except the solenoid. When I jump the two big terminals on the solenoid, and have the key in "run" position, the mower will start and run fine. It still runs fine when I take jumper off the big solenoid terminals. It won't start at all unless I jump those two big solenoid terminals. Please double check my thinking that this is the culprit. This also tells me the other switches are working OK.

That solenoid is a cute little thing. If I don't hear not to, I'll pull it tomorrow and get a new one and put it in.

[fixer67]

Jump between the SMALL terminal and the BIG one coming from the battery. If the starter runs then the solenoid is OK. By jumping between the SMALL terminal and the BIG one coming from the battery it is the same as turning the key as far as the solenoid see it. If it does not work the solenoid may still be good, check the ground for the battery wire and the solenoid . I have seen rust and paint cause a solenoid to have a bad ground and not work.You should not short the two BIG terminals for any longer than it takes to start the engine because after the engine does start and the starter is still engaged it can mess up the starter gear.

[rbig]

Yay, Yay--- I'm a happy camper!

Changed the solenoid out and it fixed the Yardman problem.

Thanks to all for the patience and advice. Couldn't have done it without you!

We also have a big Murray that I changed the blades on the other day. We noticed it was chewing instead of cutting, and leaving a strip in the middle of each pass.

Got under that thing and found the outer tips on the 3 blades curled down approx an inch. Someone obviously got in a good strike on a pipe stub or piece of metal sticking out of the ground. To get all 3 blades, I assume they got it on the left side of the deck on one pass, then on the right side the next pass. Don't know why it wasn't vibrating severely. Lucky we didn't end up losing a couple tires in the process.

We have volunteers who show up to mow from time-to-time. I think I know who did it, and it's one of well intended volunteers who doesn't have experience with riding mowers at all.. There are several of us with experience, and we try to keep doing the mowing. But, for several reasons, we sometimes end up with volunteers who are not knowledgable about mowing big, rough areas. We've got about 6 acres of pasture type terrain/grass