One thing at a time
Dip the sump, check the level then feel the oil and smell it.
Get back with your results
I have no intention of rewriting the entire JD Technical manual
I removed the hood and the flywheel cover for better access, and removed the gas line.
With the dipstick removed, and the spark plug removed, when you crank the engine lots of pressure and oil blows out the dip stick cover.
When you turn the flywheel by hand, with the other hand covering the dip stick cover, you can feel the suck and blow on the end of the dip stick cover. Does any of that info help?
Yes.
You have ruled out the most common & easiest to fix option
Most of the internals are lubed by splash so yes oil should splash out the dip stick tube.
And of course the piston is an air pump so as it goes back in the engine, the air under it has to go somewhere.
It should go out the breather which is the next thing to check.
The starter is not strong enough to overcome full engine compression so there is decompression built into the engine.
Remove the rocker cover & check the valve lash.
On OHV engines it gets bigger over time and that defeats the compression release.
The intake valve lash is .006 in, and the exhaust valve lash is .007 in. The manual says intake .003 to .005, and exhaust .005 to .007. Is this far enough out of specs to cause no compression release?
I was told that about 2 years ago the mower was running fine when it backfired when they shut it off,(which evidently it did not do normally) and it never would start after that, so it set there until last week when I got it. The hour meter shows 185.5 hours, so it seems there should be lots of good hours in it if I can get it running. Thanks for the help!!
That will depend upon things like cam wear
As you rotate the engine watch the rockers .
You should see one of them close then reopen just a tiny amount then close again .
That tiny reopen is the decompression
If it is the original19.5 Hp Intek single B & S engine then it is covered by the Briggs OHV Singles manual
It might also be covered in more detail in the J D Technical manual.
I don't have one for the D series but all of the other J D Tech manuals I have include an engine repair section which is specific to the model engine fitted which is a lot easier to use then the B & S manual which covers 50 different variations so can be quite confusing.
Add to that you will also have the repair manual for the rest of the mower.
Digital download directly from J D is the cheapest usually
CD from dealers are sometimes a bit cheaper
Printed copy is very expensive .
