Of course, answer the questions above about smoke color. The fact that it runs without the kill wire connected but not with it connected indicates that most likely the Interlock is bad. Typical. Of course it could be other things but this is the best odds. I haven't bought one for a long time, were about $15 then and of course are a Safety Feature, think liability. The smoking could be it is just plain worn out, cylinder scored, ring/rings broken, breather bad, or all of above (grin) Do you have a way to check the compression? When you spin the flywheel backwards by hand, does the flywheel rebound forwards quickly? Before you do anything drastic, remove the carb float bowl, clean it, check that the main jet going up inside the well that protruding down into the carb bowl, is tight. Is the float about parallel with the float bowl boss, seat, on the carb when the float is closed? Clean the float needle. Re-assemble, start the engine and turn the main jet adjustment screw, extending down out of the bottom of the float bowl, turn it counter clockwise slowly, does this help the rough running? Turn until the engine starts to stall or surges, turn clockwise until the engine falters, split the difference. Do the same with the Idle Mixture screw on the side of the engine at low speed. Next I would check the crankcase breather valve. I won't go into that here, email me if you want instructions. Walt Conner wconner5 at verizon dot net

Walt I am the one that bought the snapper. the model number is 30083s. Most websites I have been to to lookup parts says that this particular mower may have come with an 8 hp engine. This snapper I got for 100 bucks and I posted another article on this forum on June 16, 2009. It was in relation to the single circuit wire and the dual circuit wiring. the dual circuit after testing with a tester turned out to be faulty. The single circuit came from a 12hp Murray riding lawn mower. The fly wheel came from the murray as well. The original flywheel on the snapper had plastic teeth and there were spots in it that were bad. After measuring and talking with a mechanic from a lwan mower repair shop, it was ok to use the 12 hp flywheel and single circuit. The engine runs fine and charges the battery now. The single circuit wire runs to the push button and that connects to the positive wire that runs to the battery. Everything looks good so far. The snapper is easy to start and sometimes when cold don't even need the choke. The starter is old and has been in out in the weather some. The whole lawn mower was sitting outside a lawn mower repair shop for about a month or so. The lady who was selling it and ran the shop, didn't know anything about it. She was asking 100 and I offered 80 and she turned it down. She said she had to have 100 for it. In hindsight I probably could have gotten it from someone else for a little less than 100 bucks. Everything works on it and even the old gas that was in it worked with a little fuel treatment. The battery is 5 years old or so and it still holds a charge when put on the charger. The deck on it is not adjustable in the sense of adjusting it like on a 42inch lawn mower. It does have handlebars to steer it with. If you go to www.snapper.com and look up manuals and then type in 30083s it will show a list of manuals you can look at. Pick either one of the parts manuals and it shows pictures of what I have. It does show some examples of either a 10 or 11 hp engine, but not 11.5. Must be a newer engine than what came on the snapper originally. Still when taking into account what someone was trying to do to it to get it running before I got it, not a bad deal overall. The wiring to the push button start was actually hooked up backwards and that meant that the starter would always be running with the engine running. That might explain some of the teeth on the old flywheel being gone. The only thing I do now is turn the key to the on position and mash the button and it starts right up. There are tubes in the front tires and one front wheel actually has wheel bearsing where the other one doesn't. Howver, it doesn't affect the steering any. The drive tires has many cracks and a few plugs and it does leek air if sitting for a few days. May have to replace later on. Only put 8 dollars into it. I spent a majority of the 8 dollars on the oil and the rest on a few nuts and bolts for the blade. My dad wants me to flip it which means to sell it quickly for 250 or so and get something a little newer. The only problem is, most people around where I live that are selling lawn mowers are wanting a pretty penny for junk. I almost spent 150 on a massey ferguson that would have needed a lot of work. It had a tecumseh engine on it and it was the pull start type. The tecumseh engine was missing parts and the deck needed to be oiled and greased to be able to lower and raise it. The blades were drive with an axle typ drive that went the width of the deck and had a gear in a cover that spun the blades. The transmission belt looked good but the back part of the body was rotted with rust and needed brackets to hold the seat and body onto the frame. The tires were good and up, but there was more that had to be done. It did have the typical 3 or 4 speed tractor like shift to it. I was going to ask the man if he would take less and thought differently and left. He had many lawn mowers including some john deere rear enging riders that needed work and he was asking alot of money for them. I may try to sell mine in a few weeks after I have used it for a little while and make sure it won't breakdown on someone. Thanks for the information you have given us Walt.

That has a 6 speed Peerless transaxle, Model 930-057 Initially, I'd check to make sure the drive belt is snug and then that the pulley is still attached to the input shaft. It seems a bit odd that it will work for a bit and then not, which tends to point to the belt slipping as it heats up.

Some more rules: 3.1: Don't buy for the brand alone, but know the brand. Know that if you're buying a Troy-Bilt, Yard Man, White, Yard Machine, Bolens, or Cub Cadet you're buying an MTD, with very few differences between the brands. A Craftsman, Poulan or Husqvarna are all made by Husqvarna Group. John Deeres are all John Deeres, but the LA series is the entry level, with little in common with the X300 series, and nothing but the color in common with the X500 and X700 series. Toro sells a lot of professional grade products, and has a nice consumer line. Simplicity sells high end quality equipment intended for homeowner use. 4: You get what you pay for. If you don't want to spend a lot of money, and aren't concerned about durability or ease of use, spend less than $1500. If you want to keep this mower for two decades and want to enjoy using it, expect to spend twice that. 5: Consider used equipment. If you do daily searches of eBay and craigslist, you will find what you're looking for eventually; nice, used lawn equipment typically sells for less than half the retail cost new. You should be able to find a lightly used garden tractor (if you decide to tear into that new plot) for less than the cost of a new lawn tractor. 6. Don't get overly concerned with horsepower; focus on the transmission. Guys equate higher horsepower with higher productivity, quality, and general bragging rights. The manufacturers focus on big horsepower numbers to sell entry-level tractors to people who don't know any better. Bigger motors give you more cutting power for 48" decks and up, but with a 42" deck or smaller, horsepower is not something to be concerned about at all. The transmission is more important. Will you be using an aerator? Will you pull a cart? Do you want the forward-reverse ease of a hydrostatic transmission? A 20hp engine won't do anything for you if the transmission can't handle your tasks. Find out which transmission the tractor has, then research it on the manufacturer's website. Whether the tractor is green, red or orange, most are moved around by tuff torq transaxles. Here is a link that might be useful: tuff torq