I use the optional front roller. This whole striping thing seems to be magic. My front yard is now striping easily while the back yard is not showing any promise at all. The grass quality is the same for both locations. I am hoping the back yard will do like the front and just start striping at some point. At first the front wouldn't stripe either? I have been looking at placing some type of drag on the back of the Tru-cut but it really isn't needed on the front now. Wish I knew what caused the change. I have learned to hold up on the mowers handle bars while I cut. This really makes a difference in quality of cut, especially when cutting the ditch. This is a bit strenuous so I fatigue fast but the cut is improved. This may be the difference in striping since my back yard is a lot larger than the front and I dont lift the bar nearly as much. If its not one thing its another--now moles have invaded the back!

Regarding sirens, funny you should ask! I found a street around the corner with lots of leaf bags. I can only get 6 in my car at a time, so on my 3rd trip I pull up to the house and the house across the street has an alarm going off. So a neighbor comes out to see what's going on, the squad car pulls up and a cop gets out to investigate, and there I am stuffing bags into my car! Kind of funny. The homeowners of the leaf bag house must've seen me because when I went back for my last trip they had left a plastic bag full of branches where the leaf bags were. Sadly, I do not need a bag of branches. :) As far as leaf quantity, here's where I am at: I mulched in random leaves last week, with more falling for this weekend. In addition I'll be adding let's say 45 imported leaf bags. If I have 9000 sf of lawn, then I'm averaging 1 bag covering 200 sf. I spread one bag out tonight and it seemed to cover a pretty good area, maybe 10 by 10 with decent thickness. Am I making a dent with quantities like this? I know you said you added 8" of ground leaf mulch at one time. I'm figuring that my soil is capable of assimilating whatever leaves I put on it after a year of "morph"-izing the soil. I know I have worms the size of garden snakes that I've never seen before!

Must of been lucky. Bought an MTD at Ace hardware (Ace Special Edition) with a 42" cut and 16hp Tecumseh. Aside from the normal problems of your MTD of that era IE having the grille mounts break off after a few years) it's been great, and it was only replaced as it was really starting to not work well on hills, and in the last year has been a case of "What's going to break next when I mow?". A key to remember is any NEW tractor in that range is going to be light duty. If you have more an acre to mow with it, a newer, higher end, used model is a probably a better option. You'll get a lot of life out of one though if you keep it well maintained. Take care of it and there is no reason why you should not get a good, usable life of about 10-12 years. one other thing to keep in mind; the chief complaints of many people on a mower it seems is the motor. That is the most important part of a mower besides the transmission on a Hydro equipped tractor. The engine is going to what will go wrong 9 time out of 10 on a mower, and is often going to be to blame for issues with cutting (due to lack of power) and reliability.

Yes, there's a Toro lawn striping attachment on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Toro-20601-Lawn-Striping-System/dp/B004ZKXYUO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1470006215&sr=8-1&keywords=toro+lawn+striping+attachment