Cool. Nice engine.

Hi Rday,
Thanks for the reply and kind words, I like the looks of it too!

About the engine, I believe it's the way to go, it gives much smoother operation, has more power and is very fuel efficent.

My friend has approximately 1/3 of an acre of grass around his home, he has an actual Honda 5.5 LM with FWD, and said he can mow his lawn twice on a tank full and he has some pretty thick grass too!

I'm fairly anxious to get my mower and see what's it's like as he really likes his and says the engine starts on the first pull and that it has a lot of power as his single speed mower like mine really pulls.

I can believe the engine has a lot of power as I purchased a 4 cycle WE at the end of May and even though it has less
cc's than my 2 cycle it seems to have twice the power.

Take care.

Keep an eye on those yellow hub caps. They might come off and get under the deck and chewed up.The Honda engine should perform well for many years. I also have a four stroke string trimmer/edger. It's very fuel efficient and reliable. I use it for edging mostly. For other trimming I use an 8lb Robin string trimmer.

Hi Rday,
Thanks for the tip about the hubcaps!

I hope the engine is as good as I've heard claimed. I believe it's the GCV 160 but don't know any of the actual specs yet. Anyway it's probably Honda's base, if you can call an OHC/OHV engine a base engine so I'm hopping it will last and believe it will.

Something else I was wondering about is that the front tires sure don't seem to have much tread, judging from the picture, to gain traction and I was thinking about using my Dremel tool to cut some more pronounced treads. What do you think?

Was it you that said you put an Hour meter on you lawn mower? That sounds like a good thing to do!

I'm fairly easy on my equipment and don't abuse them. Also I'll use full synthetic oil after any break-in proceedure, if there is one?

As far as my 4 cycle String Trimmer I purchased a refurbished Yard Mahines/Troybilt/MTD from Harbor Freight and it's been working great yet it's only just over a month old. It's the Trimmer Plus series as I already had one attachment, a hedge trimmer and purchased a pole Chain saw tree trimmer.

I posted four shots on the Tool Forum [under, 'Happy with your Weed Trimmer'] showing how much work the little 26cc 4 cycle did and never faultered. Of course as I've mentioned before I'm pretty easy on my equipment. It's got at least twice the power of my 32cc Ryobi and still very quiet which I really like!

TWYL

Reads like advertising. Poorly written advertising but advertising nonetheless.

Just my yellow hub capped opinion.

David,

The GC/OHC Honda engine was introduced into the market
about 5-6 years ago to compete with Briggs, Tecumseh,
etc in the consumer marketplace. It's a good bit lesser
expensive Honda engine than it's GX counterpart, but it
will perform nicely in most consumer scenarios. YardMan
is manufactured by MTD Products and is sold thru Wal-Mart,
Home Depot, Lowes, etc. The price of the YardMan vs. the
price of an Ariens, Snapper, Toro, or "true" Honda mower
will dictate the overall quality of the mower based upon
it's cost. With your good maintenance & care, the YardMan
will give you good service, and should last for several
years of normal use. Best of luck to you, David !!

T-Man

In reply:

To obbopp,
You come across as though your some kind of Wan-a-be Cyber Patrol here on the forum.
How is it this athority has been bestowed upon you??

Just my observation.

For T-Man,
Thanks for the explaination of the Honda engines. I was reading a prior post, different thread, about the differences in the Honda engines and figured that I probably would get a lower grade such as the GCV too. Hopefully though, like you say with proper care I'll get fairly lengthy service from the Engine and mower, I'm planning on it anyway!

Interestingly enough I never took too good-of-care of the old Wards side bag mower but then I wasn't too interested in having a decent looking lawn and now I am so my perspective has changed along with having a nice mower to work with which I'll appreciate!

Happy mowing and a clean cut!

I have this same engine on a Sears Craftsman mower, which I have reported on in that segment about this engine, and also in the segment about 30 weight oil and 0w30 weight oil. It has given me perfect service for over 4 years, over 200 hours. I put an hour meter on it last year, in August, and it now has 46 hours showing, so in 4 years of use it probably has a little over 200 hours on it.

My front tires are wearing slick, and I am thinking about getting some new ones, if not this year, then the first of next year. I may try your idea of filing some more groves in these tires first, as the tire-wheel combination is pretty expensive. I give it regular service, changing the oil once a year using, in the past 4 years Mobil 1 5w30. This year, I used Mobil 1 0w30. I use my mower pretty much year round, cleaning up leaves in December and January. I wanted to see how much easier it is to start with the 0w30 oil this coming winter. It never has used any oil yet, and I'm watching closely to see if this lighter 0w30 oil will have any consumption. So far, it has 21 hours on it and no consumption so far.

Hi xlindax,
Thanks for the info about your Honda engine that pretty reasuring and a good testimonial alright!

You mentioned about using lighter weight oil to see if it might be easier to start. My buddy has a Honda LM with the same engine I believe and says his stats on the first pull.
If yours requires more that two pulls send me a message as I might know what's happening especially if there's a small squeeze blub by the carburetor.

Also I assume your using regular gas correct.

As far as the tires you might try using a Hacksaw to cut, not too deep, criss-cross groves in your tires on about a 30 degree angle across the width. This will give you a flat diamond pattern to form an approximate chevron type tread which should give you fairly good traction.

HTH, Talk with you again.

I purchased a very similar mower last year, same Honda engine, big rear wheels, but Poulan name brand. This year the power seemed to be slipping. I soon discovered that the air filter was clogged (it sometimes gets dusty when I mow). It takes only a minute to pop out the air filter and tap it a few times to remove excess dust and it runs 100% better. I do this every time before I mow now. I also bought two new air filters on eBay for about $12.

I also put an hourmeter on mine last month but it's really not necessary. I just like gadgets. Less than $20.

Here is a link that might be useful: HONDA AIR FILTERS (2 ea) GC160, GCV160, GX100, OTHERS

Perry,
Thanks too for the confirmation it's a very good engine and mower! I felt it would be.

Also thanks for the link for the air and foam pre-filter.

In case your not aware the pre-filter foam element should be
coated with oil, old engine oil works just fine just squeeze
the majority of oil out of the foam element before installing. The pre-filter will collect the majority of the dust and dirt before it gets to the paper filter in most cases. Their really quite a smart idea and sure allow the paper element to last a whole lot longer. Actually if you have a couple of them you can take the dirty one off and wash it off using some dish washing soap and let it dry so your ready for the next time to reapply some old oil to it and be ready to go.

For another tip place the clean foam pre-filter in a plastic bag and pour a little old oil on it and work the foam a bit to get the oil distributed and even squeeze out the excess in the bag for the next time. This will save you from getting your hands all oily working with it. Now why didn't I think of that before??

I had the same loss of power with my tractor, I had done quite a bit of dusty mowing too prior, checked the pre-filter and found it to be almost completely clogged. Slapped it against the rear tire a few times to knock off the collection of chaff and dust and it ran a lot better too!

Thanks for your tip and I hope my info might help you and others too.

My Toro eats MTDs for breakfest. LOL!

(Just giving you a little elbow to the ribs.) Really all the engine choices are pretty good (unless you desire a 2 cycle - which have been pretty much eliminated). I give Honda credit for good power, low weight and competative cost for this engine.

MTD decks are a get what you pay for proposition as stated above, which is just fine for a majority of consumers.

Jim

David, just curious if you priced the 556Q which has a 6.5 HP Honda and stainless steel deck.

Hope that you bought plenty of grease for the rear wheels. For the plastic hubs rubbing against the steele axle will not hold up long.

My wife calls me cheap, but i think of my self as thrifty. I have and older self propelled walk behind mower that the front wheels were getting slick. Almost no traction on a slope. Any way i was putting a new tire on my grand sons bicycle and an idea hit me. I took the wheels off the mower, cut the bicycle tire to fit each wheel, put some adhesive caulk around the wheel's, placed the cut bicycle tire on the wheel's put a screw in each end of the cut, used a tie down strap to hold everthing til the caulk set. Bingo re- capped lawnmower tires. Did this two years ago, this being the third summer they have shown hardly any wear. The bicycle tire was one of the knobby type.

Now that is a good idea!

An Update:
I started my Yard-Man's Honda OHC GCV 160 engine today for the first time and did some mowing. That's, 'One Nice Machine', started on the first pull & was easy to pull, had plenty of power, fairly quiet compared to my old Briggs and a nice stable feel to it!

Both High rear wheels have metal bearings and the mower pushes very easy.

The engine also restarted easily after being shut off for about 5 minutes and I didn't even choke it.

**
Does anyone know where to obtain fine cell foam grip material that can either be slid over the hand grip if in tubular form or wrapped around it if sold in a roll?

Your help is Appreciated!
David

Wal Mart sells a very good lawnmower handlebar grip.
Good luck with your MTD Yard-Man.

To Rollerzeke,

Thanks for the info, I'll check that out!

David

A late response:

To Jimbosc,
You said, "My Toro eats MTDs for breakfest. LOL!
(Just giving you a little elbow to the ribs.)"

NO wonder my Ribs are Sore! Thanks Jim, it seems to be a pretty nice machine and starts on the first pull with little effort! It's probably not the quality of a toro? but seem pretty nice to me and the Honda OHC engine is real sweet!

Talk with you again.

To Blaise70,
No I didn't look at the mower you mentioned, not even sure if I saw a discription of it.

To Hippy,
Luckly your wrong about the plastic hubs, mine has metal bearings which I gave additional lubrication to using some white Lithium grease and they spinn very freely. Glad I didn't have to go the Shimm stock route!

Talk with you all later.

I buy the 3/4 inch foam insulation for water pipes and cut it to length/fit and duct tape it on. Comes in 5 foot lengths for under 2 bucks. If i remember the covers at Wally World are over 3 bucks and looked China cheap to me.

For handle bar grips...try electrical rubber heat shrink splices.

Hi Guys,

Nod, the foam insulation wrap is too thick, at least what I familiar with. Some products come with a tough foam grip that I would imagine might be sold to cover a hand grip??

Tom, Are you refering to heat shrink tubing? If so I'd like something more padded.

Thanks, David

Resolved the hand grip situation.

I remembered I had some dark Grey non-slip foam mesh material and cut a couple of pieces 7" x 11 to fill up the 14" wide handle and used double sided carpet tape at either end to tack to the handle bar and then itself as I wraped it around several times.

Works fairly well and makes a much nicer feel to the grip. I may add a couple of more wraps to make the grip a little thicker yet.

Thanks for your thoughts.
David

To Rdaystorm:
'You mention about the yellow Hub Caps on the front wheels.'

Well they seemed to be fairly well snaped into place but sure enough I was just moving it around on a gravel area and one poped off so I removed the other. Thanks again for the forwarning!

For Hippy:
I removed the front wheels and sure enough they do have plastic hubbs with what looks like a tougher plastic insert to rubb against the steel axel. If it should start to wear as those are the drive wheels I'll find the right size brass
tubing to fit he axel and drill out plastic centers and put in brass inserts which is a natural lubricant against steal of course I'll still use some light Lithium grease and the wheels should be good for a long time.

Take care,
David

Hello all.

David Smith please give us an update on the Yard Man mower. Have you had any major or minor problems with the Yard Man mower?

Thanks.

Hi to Zeke & all,
Quite a surprise to get a reply after all this time but very welcome too, Thanks! I've been missing the forum too but taking care of my Mother after she had a large stroke takes a lot of time but fortunately things are smoothing out now!

Back to the Question:
My Yard Man mower has meet all my expectations and more!
It's a joy to use, has plenty of power, fairly quiet running
which I really appreciate as I don't use ear plugs or such either - no need to, along with the fact it's very smooth operaterating and stable. It's true the deck does have some flex to it but on uneven ground such as I have that works to the mowers advantage for better traction! The front wheel drive works very well too and pulls strong and the engine starts very easily even with just a slight pull.

As mentioned prior the only thing that happened was that one
front hub cap fell off luckly while pushing it without mowing, that was easily resolved with one wrap of masking tape, which I did to both caps to make the griping surface a slight bit bigger in diameter and they're holding on just fine.

I've used the mower in all three configurations Mulch,SD & RB and again very pleased with its ability. The other day I had the catcher bag completely full and it was still pulling great!

The high rear wheels really come in handy as it's easy to rock it back for turning 180 or rolling it through loose gravel as I have in some areas in the back yard.

So for my money I feel I made a very good purchase and couldn't be more pleased!! To me, comparing it to my old mower, it's like having a wide-track jeep to mow with as it makes short work of the mowing task while being a lot of fun to use!

HTH

The GVC engine doesn't use a foam pre-filter, just a pleated paper element. Front wheel drive is known to be mostly ineffective, particularly when bagging, as the weight of the grass bag takes the weight off the front end. Something is mixed up here - the drive wheels usually have steel inserts in the axle hole for longer life. It was stated that the mower is FWD, but also that the rear wheels have the inserts and the front wheels don't. Whatever, don't use any lubricant on the plastic bearings - that particular kind of polymer is very slick and requires no lube. Any oil or grease will hold grit and wear out the axle.

Congratulations on finding the right mower for your $$!

I guess every once in a while the big guys (MTD & AYP) do something right!

Happy mowing.

jim

Thanks for the update David Smith.

Seems like you have a very good mower. Glad to hear that you are pleased with your purchase.

I also agree with jumpinjimmyb about (MTD & AYP).

Good day.

Hello all.

So, David Smith didn't want to spend big bucks.
David Smith are you still satisfied with the quality and performance of this MTD Yard-Man mower ?
I have seen the 2007 year models of this mower with a larger OHV engine.

Good Day.