hi tomplum, cooling fins are free of any debris. did a test: engine cold: can crank by hand easily, with my torque wrench started engine and let it run until it died. 3/4 throttle, 20 minutes initial turn of crank: harder, but not impossible. measured ~30 ft-lbs. didn't feel real smooth after about 2-3 full cranks, seemed to get easier, back under the 20 ft-lb mark. still didn't really feel super smooth.

Hi all, I'm not mechanically inclined, so if you could give me some thoughts on what has happened I would appreciate it much. I have a Craftsman Pro Lawn Tractor, it has the B&S 24 hp ELS V-Twin with a 24" cut, that I just use here at home,(2 Acres) I've had it about 2 maybe 2.5 years and it is out of warranty. I was riding it from the garage to the yard (blades were not engaged yet) when a very loud pop happened and it died. After that, when I tried to restart it, the motor just turns but it will not start as if something in the engine broke..... I DO think this is MY fault (and I'm embarrassed to say this), but I think I was low on oil - could you give me a suggestion as to what may have broke, due to my ignorance, so I can at least have some idea of what to tell someone it may need when I try to find someone to give me an estimate to repair it? BTW, I live in a rural area and do not have any authorized B&S centers within approx. 80 miles of me (Sears store is about 58 mile away too). One last thing, I have always put new oil and filter, and air filter on it each year, and last year I put a new spark plug on it in addition to the other maintenance - I have tried to keep it running well, but this year I just made a MAJOR/stupid mistake that is gonna cost me......... Thanks for any suggestions guys (and ladies) :-)

That sounds about right, always wanted to put a pressure gauge on my B48 Onan but at over 2500 hrs and still running fine I quit worrying about it. I ALWAYS let the motor warm up for about five minutes before opening the throttle or putting a load on it. I think the main thing is that it's getting oiled, I've got two old Kohler K's that are splash lube (no pressure there) and they both still run and sound fine. I do keep a close check on the oil(check it before you start it up) and keep the oil changed regularly.

apologies I probably didn't read through everything properly, long day with babies with colds! SIGH! So basically I should make a stronger effort to spring and fall do a big layer of manure... and as I'm able to build up from what I've got to make the soil on top better... and when I dig holes in the meantime, dig a REALLY BIG HOLE. I have a raised sidebed in my front yard, all the roses in it, of course, are doing great. When the development put the front yards in, they added sloping raised beds I think to some degree. Everything in the front sloping area, in general, as long as it gets the right water seems to do pretty well. The Backyard which got no sloping, etc, and was probably not done well by the different landscaper (not the development one) I don't think was drained or graded as well as it could have been. There is an area of the yard that has never quite drained properly, and there are definitely parts of it that just will probably never tolerate saliva due to drainage, while other areas in the back have thriving ones. my wisteria doesn't really bloom... (if it doesn't bloom enough this next year I'm pulling them out. Yes I know they're monsters, but at least they haven't DIED.) AT LEAST THE GUARA IS THRIVING. haha. BLESS GUARA. (If you don't like it, lie to me.) and miraculously my weeping sakura tree is happy. :) There's one very happy wall and corner which starts with my snail vine, a big happy La France Cl, Larry Daniels, Sombreuil, Alchemist, William Shakespeare 2000, James Galway and a lot of guara, agapanthus, irises and rosemary. all are happy and large and starting to grow into each other. If I could just get the REST of my yard to look like that...! The center of the backyard is particularly barren looking to me. Maybe that's the area I should try to dig up some and build on top of since a lot of the stuff there isn't that happy. Maybe I could dig around the roses which ARE happy there? I don't know.