why do lawnmower motors die

[herler]

You mean your own engines or those of other people?

[290]

Stump grinders for the most part use the same twin cylinder engines as the ZTRs do and they eat through engines because of the excess loads put on them. I could be wrong here but another weekness of the the engines we use is they are mere twins. More cylinders may handle the stresses better.

[Oldtimer]

why do lawnmower motors die

Most lawn mower engines don't die on their own. They are usually killed.

Most owners don't RTFM and wouldn't follow it if they did.


Oldtimer

[290]

Originally Posted by Oldtimer

Most lawn mower engines don't die on their own. They are usually killed.

Most owners don't RTFM and wouldn't follow it if they did.


Oldtimer

While this is VERY true i think hes talking about a natural death.

[Oldtimer]

To determine cause of death a tech would have to perform a postmortem, otherwise it's just anecdotal.

Oldtimer

[290]

The topic is so broad one cant help but be....theres no real data on this.

[piston slapper]

Originally Posted by 290

Stump grinders for the most part use the same twin cylinder engines as the ZTRs do and they eat through engines because of the excess loads put on them. I could be wrong here but another weekness of the the engines we use is they are mere twins. More cylinders may handle the stresses better.

There are a few reasons why stump grinders eat engines ...
On many of them..the engine is operated on an angle..allowing many opportunities to scavenge the oilpump..
Using the wrong engine will shorten the engine life...the correct Command Twin for stump grinders or any application with extreme sideloads...will have a thrust bearing on the PTO end of the crank..

[piston slapper]

Originally Posted by Oldtimer

To determine cause of death a tech would have to perform a postmortem, otherwise it's just anecdotal.

Oldtimer

You're absolutely correct....there is a REASON why EVERY engine fails...
If they didn't have a reason to quit...they wouldn't...
I have been inside thousands of engines diagnosing failures..from simple rod seizures to complete scatters with hundreds of pieces...they ALL had a smoking gun...I've even been inside engines that the only thing that failed was the guy that diagnosed it..

The bulk of the engine failures are directly related to improper maintenance or usage...PERIOD.

[Will P.C.]

Originally Posted by 290

ZTR engines are run under a lot more stress. It takes a lot to get all that steel on your deck up to speed and most people engage the deck at full throttle. It also take a lot to move these heavy machines around, how many times to you stop, turn around and go again on a single lawn.

Is this true about engaging at full throttle?

[herler]

I have found, with the exception of fuel contaminated oil and perhaps the odd erratic and unpredictable internal failure, that most failures are due to operator error along the lines of improper periodic maintenance, neglect, or plain abuse.

Just looking at this thread, religious air filters...
Go pull the dipstick out of an engine on any given day, try it, any engine, anywhere, anytime, start pulling dipsticks.
Guaranteed you'll pull out more black oil than clean, and when I say black I mean pitch tar black, not in need of an oil change but so dark it's well past overdue for a change, not 5 or 10 hours or days, not even 500 miles but really far south of well past, there's also the great likelyhood that you'll pull more than a few dipsticks showing it's low on oil...

Now, the operator who doesn't change the oil regularly?
Also can't probably remember the brand, type and weight that goes in it.
Thou brand is the least important, type is next but weight is crucial.
So when it runs low they likely just dump a little of whatever's at hand in there.
Yeah, who cares.

Why engines fail.

I could go on, but the rest of this thread is doing such a fine job already.

But that's why they fail, however even a perfectly maintained engine won't last forever, some sure do run a good number of years thou.