I have been running my Stihl chainsaw and what ever 2 stroke I have for 30 odd yrs on those little 6oz bottles from any where. Hardly buy the same brand twice. I add them to 2 gallons of gas. a rich 32:1. Never any fuel troubles. The Stihl specs 40:1 and other than a little smoke while running choked its OK. So far, no complaints from my 50: 1 Husqy weed wacker either. The new stuff is ashless, you gotta mix it purty strong to carbon up stuff.

Top o' the line in '94. My neighbor had one that he ruined in '94 by doubling the oil; 16:1 instead of 32:1. The exhaust ports naturally got clogged with carbon, so he took the mower completely apart, lost some small parts and ended up taking it to the dealer in a box. The dealer sold him a 4-cycle mower (appropriate for his IQ) and probably used the 2-cycle for parts, or maybe put it back together and sold it. Absolutely wonderful lawn mowers, but a tad under-powered by today's standards. You must adhere to maintenance, particularly cleaning the exhaust ports and muffler. Once you get them clean, use of a synthetic or blend, such as Homelite 'Exact-Mix' at 50:1 can help keep it clean. I ran LB oil at 32:1 for years in a 10201 (also a '94 but with 'V' engine) and had trouble with carbon in the ports. The price seems a little high, but I haven't seen the mower. If it is a pristine example you may have gotten a steal. I'm not sure I would have bought it as my principal mower. This is like an antique car that you take out on Sunday morning and everybody gawks at. On the other hand, $225 is half-price for a new premium self-propelled mower today with the features of the 10520 (mulch, bag, discharge). Tips and info already on this site will help you maintain it; for example, there is a great auto engine paint at Wal Mart that matches the deck perfectly. Always use the original-type blade. It should also have a mulch fan mounted below the blade. You can experiment with that to see if you want to keep using it. I might take mine off (10550) when bagging but I do use it for mulching. The rear-bagging kit has a long curved black chute that carries the clippings to the back. The side-bagging kit has a short green chute. Either chute installs in place of the mulch or discharge plates. The bags and hardware for each type are different. You should have received a 'blank' (discharge) plate and a discharge port-blocking (mulch) plate with it. The plates and bag kits are always on ebay. You can download the factory manual for it on the LB site.

Congratulations on your newly aquired Lawn-Boy! Im glad to see someone who appreciates a fine machine. About 24 years ago I aquired my first Lawn-Boy, a brand new F series with aluminum deck. Man I treasured that mower, cleaning it like brand new every mowing and it treated me with one of the best looking lawns in the neighborhood for several years. I suddenly had to change jobs and move out of country for a couple years and ended up giving the mower to a young brother in law. I really hated to see it go but you have to do what you have to do for the familys future. I returned to visit family about 5 months later and when I asked brother in law how he liked the mower, well he kind of gave a dirty look and shook his head and proceeded to tell me how much of a POS that mower was and how the engine was locked up and he just threw it away! The ninny forgot to mix fuel with oil and destroyed it, only to blame the mower! Im very glad to see a mature person take posession of your mower and hope you have a lot of fun with it!

The Lawn-Boy brand is hanging on by a very thin thread. Lawn-Boy had it's problems in the 90s being the stepchild of Toro. Toro did make some improvements though. In the mid 90s they came out with the totally free-wheeling wheel clutch that allowed the mower to be pulled backward with no resistance. Toro also came out with the Duraforce 6hp 2 cycle engine. It was powerful but flawed with a weak 2 piece aluminum rod and a carburetor that caused surging if the moon was in the wrong phase. Walk behind Lawn-Mowers in general have fallen into that hole of everyday mundane ordinary equipment that draws about as much attention as the 200 amp breaker box on the side of the house. Gone are the days of full page magazine ads promoting a company's latest proud improvement like the staggered wheel design or the easy starting powerful little 2 cycle engine. You can thank our government for that. Getting an innovative change in design through is expensive and risky because of liability fears, and the roadblocks put up by the Consumer Products Safety Commission and the EPA. (The EPA is out of control by the way.)