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Hi all.I've recently was given a 1999 Lawnboy by a coworker.Was told nothing had been done as far as anything extensive other than a blade change.So it runs good.I personally changed the oil and cleaned the filters.It IS very light.Waaay lighter than my Craftsman.I'm wondering what is supposed to be so good about these funny colored,light weighted,weird looking mowers? I do realize it has lasted 19 yrs,but my Craftsman (2001)Is just as old and in the past 4 years we've cut some damn grass.Anybody?

Please don't call them that, they're Lawnperson mowers now after the lawsuit claiming sexist bias...

I don't understand the cult following of these mowers myself. My parent's had one years ago. Light green 2-stroke. I didn't like the offset front wheels. I brought it to the dump without a second thought when my Mom died.

I'm wondering what is supposed to be so good about these funny colored,light weighted,weird looking mowers?

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I don't understand the cult following of these mowers myself.

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The original Lawn-Boys (OMC) were well known for their reliable 2 cycle engines which is why I got hooked on them.
Now, Lawn-Boys are running all manner of 4 cycle anchors on them...including Kohler, Briggs & Stratton, et al.
I'm sure Ole Evinrude is spinning in his grave after witnessing what has become of his empire.

Not really a cult following, but more like folks who really appreciate a company like OMC taking engineering to the next level and manufacturing a machine that was, and still is the best in it's field. Once you mow with one, an original OMC machine, you will understand the following. I mowed lawns for spending money all through the 70s and man what a game changer it was for me in 1977 when I got my first Lawnboy Bricktop (Model 7024). Most of my clients were "Penny pinchers", so they would only request the lawn be cut when it was super high to minimize the frequency and save a few dollars over the long haul. Man that old 2 stroke would just walk right through the cool season Turf type Fescues and Bluegrass. The old Briggs I had before that would take me twice as long to get the same quality of cut.

Well as I've been reading these posts,I went on Youtube,and there's a lady on there,"catlover",who got hold of a shitload of all kinds of Lawnboys.Seems an older gentleman got 'em,fixed 'em up,and had sheds FULL of 'em.Because of health reasons,he was getting rid of as many as he could.Plus parts,engines,decks,etc.I have a rear-wheel S-P 10330 (1999) in damn good shape.Maybe tmrw (4/2/18) I'll put it to work and see how it does.Just seems so small tho.Like a toy,but we'll see,and I'll let you guys know what I think.Thanks for the feedback.Keep it coming.

mikehouse said:

Well as I've been reading these posts,I went on Youtube,and there's a lady on there,"catlover",who got hold of a shitload of all kinds of Lawnboys.Seems an older gentleman got 'em,fixed 'em up,and had sheds FULL of 'em.Because of health reasons,he was getting rid of as many as he could.Plus parts,engines,decks,etc.I have a rear-wheel S-P 10330 (1999) in damn good shape.Maybe tmrw (4/2/18) I'll put it to work and see how it does.Just seems so small tho.Like a toy,but we'll see,and I'll let you guys know what I think.Thanks for the feedback.Keep it coming.

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I think the 10330 has a Tecumseh 4 stroke. Toro bought Lawnboy from OMC in 1989 and while they still produced many great 2 strokes after that, they started transitioning to 4 strokes in the mid 90s and now a 4 stroke is all they sell. Nothing against 4 strokes, there are plenty of good ones out there, but nothing like the power to weight ratio of a 2 stroke mounted on a magnesium deck. Below is a link to a video of my 1977 Model 5024, the same model I used 40 years ago, except it is a 19 inch model and the 7024 was 21 inch. It's a fixed speed 3200 machine, no frills, just a pusher magnesium deck. You really have to use one of these to get the full effect, but here you go.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc0zBgh11kY&t=28s

All of the L-B's I've seen in her videos (Catlover) are 2 cycle.
She seems to know her way around them.

Hey Russ,you noticed that too.I believe she works on them as well.Blew me away when I saw her hauling all those machines away.Not to mention the guy with 6,count 'em,6 storage units FULL of Lawnboys.Lawnboy77,I believe you're pushing a Bricktop am I right?You guys got me all into this stuff now.

Lawnboy77 said:

Not really a cult following, but more like folks who really appreciate a company like OMC taking engineering to the next level and manufacturing a machine that was, and still is the best in it's field. Once you mow with one, an original OMC machine, you will understand the following. I mowed lawns for spending money all through the 70s and man what a game changer it was for me in 1977 when I got my first Lawnboy Bricktop (Model 7024). Most of my clients were "Penny pinchers", so they would only request the lawn be cut when it was super high to minimize the frequency and save a few dollars over the long haul. Man that old 2 stroke would just walk right through the cool season Turf type Fescues and Bluegrass. The old Briggs I had before that would take me twice as long to get the same quality of cut.

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Actually they run a poor second to the Australian Victa mowers but you would not have seen Victas in the USA because the land of FREE COMPETITION and MARKET FORCES banned them to protect he local industry and in particular Lawn Boy so ol' man Evinrude must have had some friends in high places, most likely with shares in Lawnboy.

Now that we have the history corrected, there is nothing wrong with them they were good quality, well made well engineered mowers that if properly maintained will outlive most f the people who bought them.
My 70 y/o sister still has dads old 1968 Victa 18 and uses it to mow the common areas of the block of units between the scheduled mows by the lawn care agency.
I have a couple of 50 year old Victas I loan out when I get overwhelmed ( if it ever rains again in spring ).
I understand the facination in collecting the things of ones youth, I collect old motorcycles.

Lawnboy77 said:

I think the 10330 has a Tecumseh 4 stroke. Toro bought Lawnboy from OMC in 1989 and while they still produced many great 2 strokes after that, they started transitioning to 4 strokes in the mid 90s and now a 4 stroke is all they sell. Nothing against 4 strokes, there are plenty of good ones out there, but nothing like the power to weight ratio of a 2 stroke mounted on a magnesium deck. Below is a link to a video of my 1977 Model 5024, the same model I used 40 years ago, except it is a 19 inch model and the 7024 was 21 inch. It's a fixed speed 3200 machine, no frills, just a pusher magnesium deck. You really have to use one of these to get the full effect, but here you go.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zc0zBgh11kY&t=28s

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Yes 2 strokes are the way for lawn mowers, simple efficient and much more powerful than the 4 strokes.
And if they allowed them to spin a bit faster 4000-5000 rpm they would be even better.

Enviromentally you are miles ahead with a 2 stroke because of the reduced embeded pollution during manufacture of a 2 stroke and in particular the full iron engines which will run for hundreds of years with very mimimal mainteanance.
But all the dullards can see is the smoke that they used to blow before the production of modern ashless 2 stroke oil.

Now you guys are confusing me.I'm hearing 4 stroke,2 stroke,and 2 cycle.I know the 2 cycle uses an oil/gas mix.But what's the diff between the 2 stroke and 4 stroke? Evinrude,isn't that the boat motor company? Did he start Lawnboy?And here's another thing.In one of "Catlover's" vids,her husband was gonna use 4 oz of kerosene to 12 oz of oil to clean an old engine that sat.Is that real? Can you do that?

Actually they run a poor second to the Australian Victa mowers...

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Interesting....I'd be curious to see the numbers.

And if they allowed them to spin a bit faster 4000-5000 rpm they would be even better.

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Imagine the blade tip speed. I don't think anybody would want that near their ankles.

Incidentally, Lawn-Boy made some brick top mowers for the Australian market and called them Masport and
the PYE Tecnico Powa-matic.


This 1956 Morrison found in New Zealand:

There are others...All unmistakably OMC mills.

mikehouse said:

Now you guys are confusing me.I'm hearing 4 stroke,2 stroke,and 2 cycle.I know the 2 cycle uses an oil/gas mix.But what's the diff between the 2 stroke and 4 stroke? Evinrude,isn't that the boat motor company? Did he start Lawnboy?And here's another thing.In one of "Catlover's" vids,her husband was gonna use 4 oz of kerosene to 12 oz of oil to clean an old engine that sat.Is that real? Can you do that?

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2 cycle or 2 stroke, same animal. Just semantics.
A 2 cycle engine fires once for each full revolution of crankshaft or twice as often as a 4 cycle.
A 4 cycle engine fires on every 2nd revolution of crankshaft or ½ as often as a 2 cycle.
Very generally speaking, a 4 cycle engine is about double the weight of an equivalently powered 2 cycle engine.
You can probably see why a 4 cycle engine might be a problem for a chainsaw.
Yes, Ole Evinrude started what evolved into what we know as Outboard Marine Corporation (OMC).https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lawn-Boy
Kerosene is an excellent solvent for cleaning an engine. I'm not gettin' why he would mix it with oil.

Victa made 72% of the Australian market and exported to 34 countries ( Includes the wholely owned subs of Turner & Pace )
Masport is actually a NZ company or was till MTD took them over.
AFAIK the sub standard management of Victa GMD Holdings breached their finance deal with Briggs by fitting Chinese 4 stroke engines and Briggs then forclosed, became the majority shareholder then accepted a under valued buy out offer from Briggs and became another Briggs company and now assembles sub standard "Briggs on a plate" mowers rapidly loosing market share till they become a minority of the market.

Aust is a small market so most of what we get now , sold under a local brand, are foreign made mowers rebadged.

In the 50's 60's & 70's Victa was a dominant manufacturer on a world stage 80% of the production was exported.
Now days they are a net importer.

The rot set in when they tooled up to make 2,000,000 Vortex mowers per annum assuming they would take the US market by storm and for the second time the USA government deemed them to be unsafe and refused permission to import them.
The same mower by that time was sold in 52 countries, all over Europe & even in Canada, although pressure was put on the Canadian distributor to restrict import numbers.
According to the USA government;-
they were "too quiet" and required a flashing light to alert people that they were running.
The discharge chute was too big so small children could crawl in there while the mower was running
The blade tip speed exceeded the USA safety limit ( it didnt because the USA model spun at 2900 rpm, the UK one spun at 3000 rpm & the Aus spun at 3200 )
They also wanted a parking brake to be fitted and a few other silly things before it would be reconsidered and it was blatiently obvious no matter what, the USA government was not going to allow them to be sold in the USA.
This by the way was standard USA government practice for just about anything Aust tried to export to the USA

They made new food safety laws regarding imported beef every couple of monthe to prevent Americans importing Australian beef so we sent it to Mexico where prime roasting & grilling meat was turned into hamburger patties and pet food.
This carried n till most of the Australian abbitours were taken over by USA owned companies when all of the safety concerns magically vanished.
The USA even tried to ban the Cochlea ear implant and stopped them being imported into the USA till patients had expired and local companies could overcharge the health system for inferiour copies.
Your government banned Australian made kangeroo leather car seats being imported by your factories because the hides were derrived from a government subsidized culling scheme, but happily allowed USA car seat makers to buy a fit the said same hides.
I could go on all day with examples but it would sound like sour grapes and just get boring.

Just like the USA in the 40's & 50's when there was big profit in making lawnmowers we had over 200 different brands made locally plus rebadged imports and strait imports.
Every retail chain had their own store brand plus usually a very expensive import to sell against them.
By comparrison Aust workers got pain near twice what USA workers did so we had more disposable income to spend on things like cars & lawnmowers than USA workers did so the market was proportionally bigger down here.

OTOH the ride on market was almost zero down here so the bulk of ride ons were rebadged USA ones

Merv Richardson started making his own engine in 1956 because Villiers could not supply him with enough engines for his mowers
Untill then they came with locally made Villiers and imported Villiers

Darryl G said:

Please don't call them that, they're Lawnperson mowers now after the lawsuit claiming sexist bias...

I don't understand the cult following of these mowers myself. My parent's had one years ago. Light green 2-stroke. I didn't like the offset front wheels. I brought it to the dump without a second thought when my Mom died.

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Darryl, I am no sexist or cult member, but as far as I am concerned, there is nothing wrong with admiring a product that was well made and easy to service or repair. Too bad I wasn’t around when you junked that old Lawn Boy. Depending on the model, it probably needed just a little TLC to bring it back to life. Here is a picture of my oldest one (1965) and other than a good cleaning and a few seals and gaskets, it runs smoothly and quietly and will never rust out. What is so hard to understand?

Berts, I always find your posts both interesting and entertaining. I may not be well versed on the differences of our two countries, but I sure would be proud to own one of those old two stroke Victa mowers. They are, by far, the coolest looking lawn mowers I’ve ever seen. Safety regulations be damned! Too bad I’ve only seen pictures of them.

Every knock is a boost!
Pass the steak sauce.

@mikehouse, Look for a 2 cycle L-B for some real mowing fun.

Thanks Russ & Berts.You guys have your info together.Shrewd business dealings waaay back then.I know the U.S.was all about patriotism and world wars,but never knew Berts,the smear towards Australia.But reading the 2 things of info you guys have shared,i'm reminded of the Zero hour bomb company.Which later became Zebco.Going from bombs to reels is a heckuva jump.But you guys have put a bug in me.So this afternoon 4/2/18 i'll be using this Lawnboy.Will give results.Thanks again for ALL the info guys,so awesome.

mikehouse said:

Lawnboy77,I believe you're pushing a Bricktop am I right?You guys got me all into this stuff now.View attachment 36740

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Yes it is called a "Bricktop". Any of the Lawnboys from the 50s to the early 80s with the rectangular metal shroud like that were commonly called "Bricktops". Glad you have the Lawnboy bug. I've had it for awhile now and there are really a lot worse ailments than this.

In reference to the notion that OMC was second fiddle to Victa. Well I don't know anyone that has experience with both, so not much way to compare if you haven't operated both fairly extensively. The old Lawnboys I collect and use are lifetime mowers for sure. Are there improvements that could of been made? Sure, always, but at what cost. For the money they were, and are unbeatable if you just wanted a no frills pusher that would last a lifetime. 180 bucks bought a new 1977 bricktop.

I just fix em , I don't collect , no space with all the old motorcycle parts I have acquired over the decades, but I am on a 1/2 dozen old mower forums , principally for the purpose of information mining.
And yes I have repaired a few Lawn Boys for collectors who are mechanically challenged.
Like everything from the past, there is a sort of a buzz from bringing them back to life & using them.
Comparred to what we had over here most LB's are heavy & clunky to use, but then again so are all my pre WWII motorcycles and you love them for what they are, not what they are not.

Collecting old mowers is a lot of fun ( for most ) but can become dangerously addictive.
Then again driving all the way across the country to get your hands on a rare one can be quite a fun & rewarding holiday.
A day spent at a field display is liquise a good day out regardless of which side of the fence you are standing.

Okay gents,this is what i got for you.Used the Lawnboy for the first time today.Pros=lighter than my Craftsman.Rear s-p is very good for the steep sides of my yard.The side discharge was like a blower too.Cons=Didn't cut as good as i thought(blade change),but not bad.Louder than my other.Starts up 1-2 pulls.I also did the 1/4 kerosene,3/4 oil mix to clean the engine.It works!!! Shudda seen the emissions.In all fairness i'll get that blade and it'll probably be just as good as new.Gentlemen,thank you for the knowledge you've shared.I'll be looking for your posts all over from now on.Happy mowing.