Help locating parts for Pulsar mower

[ILENGINE]

By the way, I'll admit that I have no idea what mowers are still being produced as high quality machines. Who still exists that make their own product with their own parts ending with a high quality mower? I used to be a die hard Cub Cadet fan. Then they were suddenly made by MTD. I know that my Craftsman is now built by MTD, per Black & Decker's agreement. Just wondering how many high quality manufacturers of mowers still exist. Oh, I'm referring ONLY to push mowers and lawn/garden tractors. I'm not a fan of zero turns. Yes, I'll service one or even repair one, but that's not my preference.

Suddenly as of when MTD purchased Cub Cadet in 1981. And your Craftsman by MTD B-D owned 20% of MTD and now own all of it.

Jonsered is owned by Husqvarna and were selling them through Menards a couple years ago. Trimmers, saws, pushmowers.

And I have never used sand but have used clean gravel or hex nuts to break rust and junk loose.

 

[Rivets]

Who ever posted that on another forum is a DIY guy who shouldn’t be allowed to any equipment which is not his own. Because he used the word PETROL and not gas or fuel I’m going to assume he is from outside the USA. I have used washed stones to remove rust from a tank as a way of cleaning, but the buildup needs to be very bad.

 

[smhardesty]

Suddenly as of when MTD purchased Cub Cadet in 1981. And your Craftsman by MTD B-D owned 20% of MTD and now own all of it.

Jonsered is owned by Husqvarna and were selling them through Menards a couple years ago. Trimmers, saws, pushmowers.

And I have never used sand but have used clean gravel or hex nuts to break rust and junk loose.

So. Jonsered is still being sold? Since they were bought by Husqvarna, I'm just going to assume that the new ones being sold are nowhere near the quality of the old ones. Is that a fair assumption?

Ahhh, I just did a search and found this:

As of September 2022, the product Jonsered will not be available on the market. We will continue to offer the best possible customer service to our Jonsered customers.

Which came from here:

https://www.husqvarna.com/us/discover/jonsered-products-are-no-longer-available/
.

 

[smhardesty]

Who ever posted that on another forum is a DIY guy who shouldn’t be allowed to any equipment which is not his own. Because he used the word PETROL and not gas or fuel I’m going to assume he is from outside the USA. I have used washed stones to remove rust from a tank as a way of cleaning, but the buildup needs to be very bad.

Yep. You hit the nail on the head. This was a post he put on a Linux forum I belong to. And yes, I believe he is in Australia.

I've never used stones, rocks, or gravel, but I did use a handful of clean nuts and bolts to clean the inside of a metal gas tank for a Cub Cadet Model 73. We owned that thing for years and years. The original tank developed a lot of cancer and I found a decent one that had just a slug of surface rust inside it. Being an old farm boy, once I rattled the nuts and bolts around for awhile I then resorted to using gas, over and over until nearly everything was cleaned out. Why not? We had a big, old, overhead tank on the farm that we put gas in for lawnmowers, tillers, and the A/C Model Gs that we used in the watermelon fields. I'm sure I filled my car up a few times out of it as well. LOL!

I just thought using a handful of sand on ANYTHING related to a small engine was a really bad idea, but that's just my opinion. I just have to wonder exactly how much sand remained in that tank and what the carb did when it started eating grains of sand.

What about the filter thing? Are there now filters that you simply clean and replace? Am I that far behind?

 

[smhardesty]

OK, guys. Did I ask a question so stupid nobody will respond, or has my question just gone unnoticed. I'm really curious about this filter that the Aussie said I needed to "preferably clean". Are there now such filters in use versus the inexpensive, replaceable filters I'm accustomed to?

 

[Rivets]

Are we getting a little impatient? Answers to your questions not coming fast enough? Do you realize that most of the experienced techs on this site either own their own businesses or work for a business. We get to replying to threads as time allows. Many of us also have families which require our attention and they come first on the weekends. To answer your question to the best of my ability, I know of no fuel filters which cleaning is cost effective. Many DIY guys do think they can do so, but no reputable tech would clean instead of replacing, we have warranties which we stand behind, not worth the risk.

 

[smhardesty]

Are we getting a little impatient? Answers to your questions not coming fast enough? Do you realize that most of the experienced techs on this site either own their own businesses or work for a business. We get to replying to threads as time allows. Many of us also have families which require our attention and they come first on the weekends. To answer your question to the best of my ability, I know of no fuel filters which cleaning is cost effective. Many DIY guys do think they can do so, but no reputable tech would clean instead of replacing, we have warranties which we stand behind, not worth the risk.

Ahh, yeah. My bad. I guess I was a little impatient. I'm used to computer forums where there are literally hundreds of people, all around the world, online at any one given time. I'm very aware of being a full time professional with few hours to spend online. I spent 30+ years in the computing industry. It wasn't uncommon for me to literally spend 48 straight hours, or more, working on a network glitch. At one point, I spent 14 months working 13 hours a night, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights getting a local area Walmart distribution center up and running. I then spent anywhere from 10 to 16 hours a day, Monday through Friday, building a computer network at a local area college. I left the DC at 7:30 Monday morning and drove straight to the college, where I'd spend 10 hours or more. The same thing then happened on Fridays when I worked 10 hours or more at the college, drove home for a bite to eat, then drove to the DC and began that 13 hour tour. So, yeah, I'm fully aware of what being a professional is. I started the whole small engine biz years back as a means of decompressing from all the hours working as a computer and network tech. When I did that, I spent a 10 to 12 hour day working on computers, then spent 4 hours or so each night working on small engines, plus most all day on Saturday or Sunday. I can pretty much say that the hours I spent in the computing industry were a whole lot longer than any hours spent working on small engines. I'm just guessing there aren't a whole lot of small engine techs that spend 48 to 72 hours straight working on a system glitch. I sure never found any that worked like that. And yes, I have a family. Whether I liked it or not, my profession required me to be absent from a lot of family gatherings and affairs. That was just the nature of the profession. I never had the luxury of simply deciding to take a weekend off to do what I wanted. I was on call 24/7. Way back, when I was still working mainframe computers, there were NO holidays. If you happened to draw Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's AND Easter, you just worked. There was no other option.

With that aside, I again apologize for being a bit anxious. I just thought with as many members as the forum seems to have, that one or two guys might have had an opportunity to reply. Thank you for your reply to my question. I was confused and thought that maybe I had missed a new kind of fuel filter that did away with the less expensive, replaceable filters I am used to. I'll now assume that the Aussie might not know exactly what he is talking about. I was pretty sure anyway, but responses from guys on here seem to verify that.

 

[ILENGINE]

There are cleanable fuel filters but the ones I have seen are more pushed to the auto industry. And then things get lost in translation like the owners manual for my tractor says to clean the hydraulic filter every 400 hours. It has a spin on filter.

 

[Rivets]

Most people look at the number of forum members and think as you did, some many members, lots of techs. On this forum there are less than a dozen experienced techs who frequently respond to problems. Then come about two dozen who have minimal experience, Most, about 50% of the posters are DIY guys who had a similar problem 5 years ago, don’t fully read the thread, and offer solutions which won’t help with the OP’s problem. The rest are those who no longer are around. On top of that we have the guys, 29-30 years old, who expect a working solution in 24 hours, but never bother to post relevant info because we are the experts with ESP.

 

[smhardesty]

There are cleanable fuel filters but the ones I have seen are more pushed to the auto industry. And then things get lost in translation like the owners manual for my tractor says to clean the hydraulic filter every 400 hours. It has a spin on filter.

I did just a quick search for fuel filters that can be cleaned as opposed to being replaced. I think the cheapest one I ran across was $27. That could buy quite a few replaceable filters. I'm sure the ones that are to be cleaned are relatively easy to clean, but can they be cleaned as well as a brand new, replaceable filter will be? I'm guessing they are at least supposed to be that clean, but I'd worry about contamination left in the cleanable filter. On the other hand, if there was suddenly no other choice, I'd have to get used to cleaning the fuel filter.

It seems funny that in a world where so much is now "throw away", they'd introduce a cleanable fuel filter. I expect those filters have a real use in some application, somewhere, but I can't see them as being a reasonable alternative to the inexpensive, replaceable filters in use on most small engines. But, now I know.

I am finally over that step throat that hung around for a lot longer than I expected. I'm headed to the shop to see if I can get that bracket straightened on this wonderful Pulsar mower. Hopefully I can. Then, I'll get the parts ordered to get it up and running.

I should probably start a new thread for this question, but since it still pertains to the Pulsar, I'll ask it here. Assuming I get the bracket straightened and then get the mower running as it should, what kind of price should I hang on it? I feel stupid for even asking this question, but I have no history with these Chinese products. I have only dealt with mowers carrying Briggs, Kohler, and Honda engines, with a few Tecumsehs thrown in. I have two thoughts. One, it's a really cheap, Chinese product that has NO replacement parts available anywhere except directly from the home office. With that thought in mind I'd have to say it's a $75 mower, give or take. But, then there is the fact that it still carries the original $149.99 price sticker on it and it has only been used two seasons. If I get it running like it should, and get it cleaned and shiny like I'm sure I'll be able to, is it a mower worth hanging a $100 to $125 price on? What is the market for something like this? I haven't managed to turn up another used mower like this for sale anywhere on the 'Net, so that didn't help me.