Engaging blades kills engine

[nobot]

Good grief. The man never said his grandson was a child. Did you consider that he could be 70 years old, with a 30 year old grandson?

 

[nobot]

Don't misunderstand me. I believe in the safety measures, that they are there with good reason. But if the grandson is 30 years old, he's old enough to make up his mind about losing appendages. The grandson may be 12 years old. My point is: Don't jump to conclusions.

 

[cpurvis]

Hi, Charles from TN here.
My Ariens A21AH2 is giving me a big headache. Several years ago I disabled the seat safety switch and it ran perfectly for a long time.
A week or so ago I replaced the drive belt. No problems with the routing, just took a little while.

My grandson was mowing 2 days ago and suddenly the blades quit spinning, and the motor started backfiring and missing, and finally quit.
Apparently, in the time between disabling the seat switch and 2 days ago, the cable from the seat switch (which I had tucked into the battery compartment) had slipped out of there and down into the belt and gears just below, and was cut and mangled, connector and wires both gone.
There's nothing wrong with the belt or deck, I disconnected the belt to double-check., but the engaging the blades kills the engine.
Got's to be related to a safety switch, I'd say.

I assume that's the issue with the blades not starting, what's left of the seat switch is sending a ground to the magneto as a safety measure.

I've been on YouTube all day yesterday and today, and haven't found a fix.
How can I verify and repair/disable this issue?

Thanks,
Charles

Can you get a new wiring harness for the mower? It may not be much fun to install but that would restore it to working condition.

If that's not in the cards, a wiring diagram, some wire and connectors and sweat will get you back up and running but I wouldn't know how to tell you how to do that without the machine right in front of me.

I don't see bypassing the safety switches as any more dangerous than having the kid operate a piece of old, or even new, equipment that has none of that safety equipment on it.

 

[bertsmobile1]

Don't misunderstand me. I believe in the safety measures, that they are there with good reason. But if the grandson is 30 years old, he's old enough to make up his mind about losing appendages. The grandson may be 12 years old. My point is: Don't jump to conclusions.

No body jumped to any conclusions .
That is exactly why he was asked in the first response " how old is your grandson"
However the reply was basically " None of your business"
From which one could easily jump to the conclusion he was trying to hide the fact the grandson was a small child who should not be operating a ride on mower .

You might also like to notice that Charles never responded to the thread again .
You can draw what ever conclusions from that you wish to

 

[nobot]

It's nobody, and it truly is none of your business. Your question is outside the scope of this forum. Help the man fix his mower. Your easily jumped to conclusion is just speculation, period. It does nothing but allow you to create some drama and to be condescending and judgmental. I don't blame the guy a bit for not responding. Let's fix some mowers.

 

[mmoffitt]

Yes! Safety first with whatever you are doing!

 

[bertsmobile1]

It's nobody, and it truly is none of your business. Your question is outside the scope of this forum. Help the man fix his mower. Your easily jumped to conclusion is just speculation, period. It does nothing but allow you to create some drama and to be condescending and judgmental. I don't blame the guy a bit for not responding. Let's fix some mowers.

You are welcome to proffer what ever advice you feel appropriate
As Charles did not provide the information asked then I have no intention of offering any more to him
And this happens regardless.
If I ask for some information & it is not given then I stop providing any help no matter what the problem is or the circumstances are.
And I did not ask for the grandkids age
And I am not making a song & dance about it
And Star in post # 7 told Charles what he thought the replacement harness part number was and where to get it.
For which you might have noticed no thanks were given

From that point there was no need for any further comment .
But for some reason others seem to think it is their duty to take offence on Charles's behalf

And Today I fixed 3 mowers with my own hands plus offered FREE help to 11 more on this forum .
How many have you done ?

 

[StarTech]

Where are you with these rules?

From what I gather Bert is in Australia or somewhere in that area of the world. Just not sure, never asked him.

 

[StarTech]

And yes I did my research and found the possible harness which costs less than the individual parts. But OP never posted the actual model number which is different than the layman version that was posted.

And no I am not instructing anyone on how to bypass safety measures. I do it for testing here with extreme caution but I restore the safeties after testing. In this case I have not even found the seat switch connector housing separately anywhere yet plus you would need the wire terminals and the proper crimping tools. The pair crimpers (2 each) that I have that does the factory style crimps cost me $70 each and I even had one of the dies modified for doing the male Delphi terminals that I work with here.

And personally YouTube videos will get you in trouble if you view the wrong ones.

And believe me equipment operators and owners do very stupid things like the one that duct taped his walk behind mower's blade on. I would have never thought someone would be that dumb until I personally seen it. And yes I have seen a 10 yr old operating a massive farm tractor in Alabama years ago.

 

[nobot]

This isn't a competition, to me. If you want to toot your own horn, Bert, go ahead. I imagine we're all proud of you for your accomplishments. That's speculation, but not an accusation. I have offered advice to a couple of people - I'm no expert at this, and have never claimed to be one. If I feel like I might be able to help someone, I write something. I found it offensive and outside the scope of this forum (more speculation) that the OP was getting grief about his grandson - that's all. I agree completely that safety is a primary concern in life. I'm all for protecting the innocent, too. It appeared to me that the OP was being shamed and guilted unnecessarily because of someone's speculation, and I thought it detracted from the spirit of the forum I want to be a member of. If I have offended anyone, so be it. I feel that accusations based on speculation and assumption lack substance, so I spoke up, figuratively. Again: Let's fix some (more - go, Bert!) mowers. Truth be told, my original intent was to get a laugh about the absurd idea that some innocent 30 year old grandson might hurt himself because of his grandfather's neglect. Sue me.