How Was The Engine Teardown On That Lawnboy?

 So I have this tiller, which was a real troublesome engine to start. I assumed it had a sheared, or partially sheared key.
THAT turned out to not be the case. I believe it, after a suggestion by a viewer, has the wrong flywheel, as it's likely a lightweight flywheel, meant for a lawnmower, which uses the blade as the flywheel momentum to keep the engine spinning, to make starting easier, and maintain rotational energy between power strokes.

I looked online looking for a broken lawnmower that I can salvage the engine on, with either a Tecumseh engine, or one I can replace the Tecumseh engine on, with a different one that is more reliable, like a Honda, or a Briggs.
I came across a Lawnmower mower, with an engine with a hole in it. I thought, hrmm, this might make a good video. It turned out to be a good idea overall, as I got a better idea on how to take these silly things apart, as I have a couple that I need to take apart.
Including a Craftsman with a piston with many holes in it.  Kinda needs to be fixed.

I have an upcoming video on that, as well as a blog post, so stay tuned.

Well, getting into the tear down...

It started out pretty simple. The bolts weren't too tight at all, but using the impact driver, it made it pretty simple, and quick.

After getting the engine shroud off, I had an idea about recovering the flywheel key, as well as the flywheel.  I wanted the Key for that Tiller, and needed the flywheel for a lawnmower I split the flywheel on. Oops!

The flywheel key, however, was toast. It clearly sheared when the engine blew itself apart. Well, that was tragic!

After the flywheel was pulled, off came the carburetor, and air filter box.
As soon as that intake came off, tho, a whole bunch of oil came pouring out of the intake.  Oil should not be coming out of the intake!

After that, it was time to open the head and see the shape of the valves and piston. So, 1/2" inch socket, impact driver, and I ripped them off pretty quick.

Head came off pretty easy, but I must say, the resemblance to "Truck Nuts" is rather uncanny...

Getting the Sump off was ridiculous! I highly recommend, before you try to take the sump off one of these, make sure you get a grinder, and clean off the rust from the crank shaft, so it's easy to hammer the sump down off the shaft.
What a disaster!

I buggered up the threads on the crankshaft, unfortunately, as the crank journal for the piston was great! It would have definitely been a completely reusable crankshaft, except I kinda made a mess of the threads, so into the scrap bin it went.

The piston, which fell out while I was removing the crankshaft from the engine, was in remarkably great shape! I can definitely reuse this piston in another engine, no problem at all! It's in excellent condition.

Spinning the Governor

The governor is actually still in really good shape, but I never bothered to remove it, just left it as part of the sump. But since it is still in decent condition, I just need to clean it out and should be able to reuse it.

Like I was mentioning about the crankshaft. It was still in great condition, other than the fact that I buggered the threads.

The Engine Block was in really good shape, especially the bore. But with that gaping hole in the side of the block, it was destined to be scrapped, and that's exactly what happened to it.

I learned a lot with this teardown. I definitely learned a lot. The biggest thing I learned about it was making sure to prepare the crankshaft so that I can remove the sump easier, which is something I'll be doing on the next teardown! I don't want to have a repeat where I was smashing the heck out of the crankshaft, and sump, for 30 minutes straight because it just wouldn't come off...

So expect many more engine teardowns in the future. I really enjoy them! It may not be the most profitable way to sell small engines, but at the same time, it can be quite profitable if you have good used, and hard to find, parts for some of these engines.

Anyway guys,

Chat soon!