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It is a long shot but easy to check: At the bottom of the engine block there is a grounding bolt. This sometimes comes lose and if it does, you have intermittent spark . Had this problem on mine, It would stall out like yours. Replaced the battery 2x before I figured out it was the ground wire...

The heat gun has a red-hot heating coil inside. If there are any fuel vapors present, it is hot enough to ignite them. In a closed space, an explosion, and possibly fire can be unpleasant. In this case, you could argue that prior to pulling apart the fuel line connection, there were no fuel...

I just did. Have 10 hours on my 52" ari apex ( about the same as the gravely hd). The factory new blades were rather badly out of balance. I have a wall mounted ball bearing blade balancer. Took me 1/2 hours per blade to get them balanced. Runs noticeably better in every way with the new...

It is not entirely clear why they specify a 15w50 or 20w50 motor oil for this application. Some people think it is just a lazy spec, which goes like "oh well motor oils are easy to get so why not" There are some who think the multigrade SAE viscosity they ask for is optimal for the high...

NealS, what did you do, drill out the deck for the extra pulley? Did it help? How did you prevent the deck from rusting there, where the powder coating is drilled out? Sounds like a rational mod, I am just worried that they would cancel my warranty on the deck. Unclear what you mean by...

Guilty, I tend to be a bit heavy on theory. I am a software guy. :-) AFAIK For the typical small 2 cylinder engine in the 15-30 hp range the correct minder measures in the 0-8 inch range. My Kawi FR691 w a new filter pulls about 1" . I am planning on changing the outer filter when it gets to...

Bert, Do you use filter minders (Vacuum gauges) to actually measure the air filter restriction? I get that too much restriction can cause running rich, e.g.: if the restriction increases beyond 4" (afaik) and the filter is supposed to be replaced at 7-8" . I would love to hear someone...

Bert, thanks for providing the Australian context. I was already convinced that fearmongering here in the US had no rational basis. My filter minder demonstrates to me that the snorkel style airbox, and the safe and efficient double cylindrical filter does not cause undue air restriction...

I asked my mower (Ariens) dealer about whether he or Kawasaki offers the cylindrical filters as an upgrade, and he looked at me like I had 2 heads. So it does not look like they do in the US. All these upgrade kits are either put together as a DIY solution, or some enterprising companies...

Are those kits aftermarket kits, or are they "approved" by Kawasaki? Not that I care much, just curious. ( I already convinced myself it is a good idea to put a cylindrical filter on the engine, without any downside) Super expensive,. Partly because they replace the air cooiling shroud, which...

It looks like this mower deck used to have a severe harmonic vibration and I think they fixed this to some degree by incorporating the "anti vibration kit" they were giving people to try out. I am thinking this, because the original tensioning arm used to be black, and now it is silver, just...

Motorcycle oil may be OK. I ended up not going for it, because I am worried about friction mods to work better with the typical wet clutch. The gist seems to be to make the oil a bit less slippery, which is not particularly useful for the Hydros. I felt that was a relevant difference, but...

I did the "reposition tensioning pulley to increase belt tension". Repositioning the tensioning pulley made the deck vibrate less overall, esp at full RPM. Instead of the belt section whipping between the pto and the center pulley, now the tensioning arm is bouncing excessively. Ariens...

Do they? I could not find anything like that. This was the first thing I asked my dealer, if there was a filter / airbox upgrade option for the FR engine and he said "no". aslthough he agreed they "should". So now I am curious. where does Kawasaki offer a Baldwin airbox upgrade, and...

Following up on the deck vibration topic. I measured the current PTO belt tension. The common sense guideline suggests 1/64 inch deflection for every inch of segment length using a deflecting force of 10 lbs. The segment in question is 72 inches. According to the generic principle...

OK.. back to the original topic: deck vibration. On my 2021 model Ariens Apex 52, the PTO belt tensioner pulley arm has 2 mounting position for tensioning pulley, (and the belt safety "finger") I can move these to the mounting holes to the left of the current factory position, and this will...

HTHS? That may not be a bad idea. If the fluid is supposed to stand up to high heat and high (molecular) shear, car manufacturers tend to spec the required min HTHS. If you will, it is a more "modern" oil spec. developed to quantify how the oil behaves in such environment. Slomo, you could...

My point was, the Hydro manufacturer Hydrogear and multiple Zt manufacturers (those who use the Zt Hydros) seem to all recommend 15W50 or 20W50 motor oil. This recommendation makes sense to me on multiple levels, so I follow it. Kinematic viscosity can be measured at any temperature the...

Shear: In motor oil context, this refers to thinning of an oils in extreme circumstances, which cannot be explained by temperature differences alone. Long chain Viscosity Modifiers may end up with their long chains chopped (sheared) , which leads to these VM-s losing some of their efficiency...

Yes. sorry about that, got carried away... I promise not to post about ai filters here.

Well put, Cpurvis, thanks. I do follow the manufacturer's suggestions, unless they suggest something that contradicts common sense, (or when I see an apparent ulterior motive). I respectfully put forward that I do not expect manufacturers to be interested in prolonging their product's...

Slomo, note that Hydrogear lists the cSt at 120 celsius. At 100, this would translate to a higher cSt, so you cannot directly compare the @100 and @120 values. It is a high shear, high temperature application. Hydros may run as high as 150 celsius, so the heavy, high viscosity 20w50 motor...

Did they say with a straight face that the "traditional" oil does not sheer down to something less than the required minimum 120 celsius viscosity over the 400 hour service interval? Or deteriorate in other ways? Does anybody here believe that the traditional oils are "just as good" as the...

Sure. Making a case for this upgrade. It is a worthy upgrade on multiple levels. The solution (complete with the filter minder) takes the guesswork out of air filter changes, and contributes to the longevity of the engine. (Mainly by cutting down on airborn particles entering the intake...

Just to be clear, the air volume delivery capability can be stated as: The air box and filter(s) are able to pass through X CFM air, while causing no more than Y inch ( water column) air flow restriction at the engine air inlet. The "air restriction" caused by a new air filter is not a fixed...

I am surprised when a manufacturer recommends conventional oil vs synthetic. E.g.: a Hyundai dealer told us that traditional oil was the new recommendation for the Sonatas in 2016. Runs counter to anything i understand about dyno and synthetic oils. My reaction at the time was same as now...

Born2Mow, it is not clear what question you refer to when you say "The basis of your question". Would you mind clarifying? If you refer to any Questions I asked of Slomo above, I was practicing the Socratic method. :) I do not doubt that the product design and engineering team knows a lot...

The primary recommended lubricant is Gravely / Ariens 00057100 15W50 hydro fluid, which is "fully synthetic". So a synthetic based product is not necessarily a bad thing. Interestingly several Ariens manuals do mention that this fluid (prod. # 00057100) is actually the Mobil-1 15w50...

Slomo, 5 times, every hour or two of operation? Seems excessive, and I am curious where does the 5 comes from. Why not 7 or 3? (I have a fear of even numbers). Could you share your thinking and explain why a still working filter needs to be swapped out after an hour or two of operation...

An used filter indeed does a better job at filtration than a brand new one, as long as the typical pressure differential across the filter does not exceed the bypass valve opening pressure. Some filter makers publish the dirt holding capacity of the filter, and they even have different...

BTW dealers perhaps could have an interest in selling you small filters at big prices, so their advice in this matter is hardly impartial.

I have a Donaldson on my FR691 , with a 1..8" ( water column) minder. So my thinking on the "running rich, causing EPA / CARB issues" is pretty simple: Other than providing nice, filtered air, and some air restriction, what else is there? (In terms of the filter interacting with the...

BTW just put a Donaldson housing on my FR691. Since it has a threaded hole for a filter minder already, I put a JD filter minder on it which measures the highest restriction that occurs during operation in the range of 0-8" water column. Did mow with it, and it measured < 1" restriction...

They told me the vibration issue is known to them. They recommended to put on a PTO belt 1" to 1.5" shorter than what it came with. Sorry, said they, they do not have such belt. And of course I have to pay for it... Pretty lame. I am using it as it is for now, hoping that it will "wear in"...

You are right.. I am just dragging my feet. I expect they will tell me "They all do that, it is normal", and I am not looking forward to hearing that. How many of you heard that answer? (I know it is stupid, but let's see how far I get with Ariens. At the very least Ariens will answer my...

Effectively, by replacing the tensioner arm with one with a different mechanical advantage, you have just increased the tension on the belt, right? Was there a calculation involved to estimate the amount of tension increase or did you just eyeball it? Or maybe you have a belt tension gauge...

Does anybody have the belt tension spec for the Apex 52 ( same as HD 52) PTO belt? Is it something like 1/2" deflection @12 lbs pressure perpendicular to the belt? It would be even better if they had different tensioner springs to swap out to adjust the tension. My feeling is that the belt is...

Did the new (seems like, tighter) belt eliminate the dancing / whipping belt syndrome as it is coming off of the PTO?

I wonder how well the "factory new" blades are balanced? We assume that they are near perfect. I have deck rattle and vibration on my brand new Apex 52. Have not really analyzed yet. but it is very noticeable compared to my 20 years old Scotts tractor, which run smooth as butter. I have a...

The problem with not detecting a leak is that the filter minder only shows the highest reading seen since reset. So if you started off with no hole, the minder went up to whatever restriction the filter causes, and it will not go down on its own if the circumstances change. . One way to...