Outdoor Power Equipment (Lawn Mowers, Snow Blowers, Chain Saws and more) Discussions

OK, my snowblower has a Tecumseh engine, so when I read this I thought it could be either BS, correct, or old news.

You can't go wrong with a Briggs and Stratton engine. Tecumseh engines are prone to throwing piston rods through the crankcase wall if the oil level drops at all. The Tecumseh speed control is not nearly as robust as the Briggs and Stratton either. Briggs & Stratton is now back in the snow blower engine business in a big way with overhead valve engines ranging from 6.5 through 13 horsepower. Given prices, contracts and market inertia it's anybody's guess how quickly they will regain market share. However if you shop around machines can be found with these engines.

Anyone with any knowledge care to comment?  Here's the link.
http://home.gwi.net/~spectrum/snowbuying.html


--SnowRemover

nibbler wrote: Sigh

It figures, I went back to the site and behold, I found the exact quote. I got distracted by all the neat stuff there and wandered off to some of the other pages without gettting to the bottom of the one I originally went to.

Over 30 years ago Briggs for reasons that I am unaware of stopped producing engines for snow blowers. Last season they got back in the market with a vengence. Not only did they start producing OHV blower engines but they also to my understanding acquired Simplicity and Snapper. This accounts for the Briggs power on those two brands this winter.Great way to increase market share!

 It is true that Tecumseh engines blow their rods if the oil level is low or if they over rev when the governor linkage sticks. If you allow these conditions to evolve in your equiptment then suffer the consequences. I am on my second Tecumseh powered machine, the first one being sold to a close friend. Both have had no issues with the engines. I rebuilt a Tecumseh with a blown rod  that belonged to that same friend. Cause? No oil in the crankcase.

My 87 year old father cleared last weeks Long Island storm with his 1960 Briggs powered Simplicity . I don't believe that machine would still be in service if it had been run without oil or used with a sticky governor.Do you?By the way ,he doesent like Tecumseh. Why? He's a Briggs man! Why ? Cause that s' what he has! Ford vs Chevy!!!  

Take care of your stuff and it will take care of you. Abuse it and

Marc 

mml4 wrote:
And that's a fact Jack! 

Seriously, that is so so true. I have seen engines of all types and ages in my years, some old and working, some old and not working and some new and not working. It usually boils down to user maintenance to whether the engine expired or not or had all kinds of trouble.

Then you have people like me that have had a 3.5 Tecumseh and neglected the heck out of it, never changed the oil or air filter and 13-14 years later it still ran. My grandparents had an old steel decked push mower with a little Briggs on it, the engine was painted white, that's how old it was. That thing never saw maintenance and ran and ran and ran. While we see some of these things, they are certainly not the rule and I am not sure why they ran that long, just dumb luck I guess? Or, in the case of my little Tecumseh, maybe it would have seen 30 years if I had taken care of it and 13-14 years was a short life?

I am certain that if we had engineering notes to study we would find inherent problems within certain models of any brand of engine. Matter of fact I bet people like Sir Buttlint sit back and laugh at these threads because they could sit and right novels about any small engine out there and make it to where we would be leery of buying anything. 

Sometimes what we don't know is good for us.

While this has been debated and argued in the past I personally have never seen it or heard of it in person and I am surrounded by Tech engines of various ages and sizes blowing snow up here in the harsh winters we have.  I have a buddy who bought a Ariens 824 with a Tech engine from a hardware store.  He did not check the oil and ran the machine in a huge snow storm and that sucker according to him ran for about 30 minutes before kicking it.  That's impressive in my book.

When the day comes besides that that I run across a Snow King engine that has thrown a rod I will gladly post it.  Now that is my experience.  Pete has been into snowblowers much years more than me.

C

I said it before on the old board:  Like my daddy used to say "they're all good until they  break, then they're just more sh*t I have to fix".  The definition of a bad product in my mind is one that fails despite proper use and maint.  Tec engines in my experience and opinion are no more prone to failure(any failure) than any other engine.  And anyway, since when the hell was failing due to lack of oil a bad thing???  How could anyone believe that an engine wouldn't toast if run dry???  I mean WTF????

Snowremober,
There once was this couple that had returned from thier vacation and found that someone had removed all the contents from thier house....except thier toothbrushes.

buttlint wrote:

Perhaps the fruit of the grape has gone to my head...but this means, what?

the thieves don't care about dental hygiene?

the thieves didn't want toothbrushes with germs on them?

the thieves had stolen enough and could afford to buy their own toothbrush?

(Martha....where is my Advil !!!!!)

They stole none of the toothbrushes? New or used?

Monk could figure this out.

everyone in the house went about brushing in a normal manor. a few weeks later the owner of the house relized that his camera was not stolen either and the film was full. after getting the film developed he got a sick shock. a pic of some guys bent over naked with the tooth brushes stuck up there a$$es.   .

Thanks Kneebiter.

I thought there was a reasonable answer.