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Hello

I picked up a Yard-Man by MTD 13AA604F401 mower from a friend for $100 a year ago, it ran great all of last year and is still running good now. It has a Briggs & Stratton 13.5HP OHV 311777 0209-E1 engine in it.

I've noticed the mower seems to be idling a little rough - So i plan to give the whole mower an overhaul e.g. tune-up, re-filling grease points, adjustments etc etc.

Planning to start with the engine, oil change, new spark, filters and so on. I'm doing this all based off of the adjustments and serviceable items specified in the manual for the engine. One item it talks about is checking the Engine's RPM when adjusting the carburetor and making adjustments as necessary. How do you actually use a tachometer on a mower engine though, don't you have to wire those up to get an accurate reading?

Page 15 of the attached manual is where it discusses carb adjustment and the RPM

Thanks,
Allan

B&S had the habit of sticking HP stickers on engine for what the customer wants. That model was most commonly labeled 14 - 14.5 hp
.As for tacks, depends on what tack you are using. Popular one has a wire lead which is wrapped around spark plug wire to give reading.

Walt Conner

Tinkerer200 said:

B&S had the habit of sticking HP stickers on engine for what the customer wants. That model was most commonly labeled 14 - 14.5 hp
.As for tacks, depends on what tack you are using. Popular one has a wire lead which is wrapped around spark plug wire to give reading.

Walt Conner

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I currently don't own a tachometer, i will buy one if it's worth it for tuning. Any suggestions for a tach? I imagine some of the real cheap ones aren't very accurate.

Tiny Tach is the way to go.
About the size of a box of matches ( showing my age here ).
Picks up the RF from the HT lead and will work about 1' away from the lead.

bertsmobile1 said:

Tiny Tach is the way to go.
About the size of a box of matches ( showing my age here ).
Picks up the RF from the HT lead and will work about 1' away from the lead.

Click to expand...

Thanks, is the attached screen shot the one you're referring too? I can't post links yet..

Tiny Tack is probably the way to go but I have never owned a tack in ~70 years of working with small engines. I set them by "by ear". Main thing is too not set them too low. Many people like to see how slow they can idle their engines not realizing that they are not getting enough lubrication by doing that.

Walt Conner

Tinkerer200 said:

Tiny Tack is probably the way to go but I have never owned a tack in ~70 years of working with small engines. I set them by "by ear". Main thing is too not set them too low. Many people like to see how slow they can idle their engines not realizing that they are not getting enough lubrication by doing that.

Walt Conner

Click to expand...

Noted, thanks. I plan to set my mower by what the manual says, which is around 1750 rpm idle on the SLOW throttle setting. It may already be running at that so we'll see.

Tinkerer200 said:

Tiny Tack is probably the way to go but I have never owned a tack in ~70 years of working with small engines. I set them by "by ear". Main thing is too not set them too low. Many people like to see how slow they can idle their engines not realizing that they are not getting enough lubrication by doing that.

Walt Conner

Click to expand...

I also set then by ear, but I do have access to one if I need to, over time "Years" you get to know them...!

phem0r said:

Thanks, is the attached screen shot the one you're referring too? I can't post links yet..

Click to expand...

Right company, wrong tach that one is for installing on the mower cause it measures running hours and has mounting holes.
I think the hand held one is in the "tools" section, it is a little more expensive because it has a remote pick up the one you are looking at has a wire to wrap around the plug lead.

bertsmobile1 said:

Right company, wrong tach that one is for installing on the mower cause it measures running hours and has mounting holes.
I think the hand held one is in the "tools" section, it is a little more expensive because it has a remote pick up the one you are looking at has a wire to wrap around the plug lead.

Click to expand...

This one? https://tinytach.com/handheld-tachometers Model - DTI-FT100

It sounds like i could still use the TT2A Gasoline Tiny-Tach as it reads RPM still(according to the site), i'd just have to wrap it around the HT lead right?

Yep,
That is what I am using now.
I used to have a large analogue one which was a lot easier to use but it died and is $ 280 to replace.
Like the others I do them by ear but always use the tacho for setting speeds on hand helds cause once you get over 10,000 rpm my ears are lost.