Scotts

[BlazNT]

Careful there Chuck, you're steppin on my mower's toes now, ..:laughing:..:laughing:..:laughing:

Oh no, I am not. Murray used to be a good machine. Now they do not exist. Briggs has destroyed what name they used to have with the garbage they produce now. I was at WalMart early summer this year and looked them over. I pulled up on the back corner and the frame twisted. I could actually lift one tire off the ground without the other moving. I was in total shock.

 

[Boobala]

Oh no, I am not. Murray used to be a good machine. Now they do not exist. Briggs has destroyed what name they used to have with the garbage they produce now. I was at WalMart early summer this year and looked them over. I pulled up on the back corner and the frame twisted. I could actually lift one tire off the ground without the other moving. I was in total shock.

Well Thank You for the clarification, I agree, ALMOST any mower produced lately is garbage, the Quality built mowers, I doubt will be found in the big-box stores, and you will pay highly for the good quality machines. YEP, I further agree, today's Murray's are far from what I have in my 2003 & 2005, even today's engines are questionable. You can check out my photo album on this site and see I took my 1st Murray fully apart, it was a well used machine when I got it, but everything is solid, yes I replaced the trans and several costly items, BUT, now that machine will most likely outlast me ( provided I keep it maintained,) and it sure would please the eyes if it were repainted, but it's a mower! and a damn good one at that. They don't make em like they used to ! ..:thumbsup:

 

[Boudreaux In Eunice La.]

Hey guys.. I have a Hustler ZTR, but also have a Scotts that I have been using for many years. Been an awesome mower. The reason I am poking my head in here, is because I want to ask if this forum is where I would want to ask questions etc about my old Scotts mower. It is actually as some of you may know, a "re-badged" John Deere. JD wanted to enter the big box stores but couldn't do that in competition with their JD dealerships, so they re-branded (and painted orange) certain models of their lawn tractors, and sold them in box stores under the "Scotts" brand. JD sometime years ago stopped putting out the Scotts, but sometimes I still might have questions or just talk about my old Scott mower. Is this the place I would do that in seeing it is in reality a John Deere painted Orange?

I remember the old Scott's mowers and we had 2 of them with Brigg's on them also.............

That was almost 20 years ago when we had them..... My cousin asked me who made them ??? I lifted the hood and there was John Deere Green all over the place....... Yes they came from a big box store and a local one at that... LOL A local lumber yard to be exact... That was our big box store ~!~!

Hurricane Rita took one of them from us in 2007 we think... The other was still there after 25 feet of water went down.......... Took the oil out and cleaned the mud and silt out, then changed the oil and new plug with a carb clean and she cranked right up....

Hurricane Ike got it a couple years later we think.... A 2 legged Ike LOL ............

I love those mowers and the forward and reverse 1 foot operation for the hydros ~!~!

 

[Boobala]

I remember the old Scott's mowers and we had 2 of them with Brigg's on them also.............

That was almost 20 years ago when we had them..... My cousin asked me who made them ??? I lifted the hood and there was John Deere Green all over the place....... Yes they came from a big box store and a local one at that... LOL A local lumber yard to be exact... That was our big box store ~!~!

Hurricane Rita took one of them from us in 2007 we think... The other was still there after 25 feet of water went down.......... Took the oil out and cleaned the mud and silt out, then changed the oil and new plug with a carb clean and she cranked right up....

Hurricane Ike got it a couple years later we think.... A 2 legged Ike LOL ............

I love those mowers and the forward and reverse 1 foot operation for the hydros ~!~!

AHhhhh yes Bo, forward AND reverse on the rocker type giddy-up-go pedal, I have seen several of those,I believe they were on the machines with the variable speed pulley set-up, sorry, can't remember !

 

[Tudorp]

I have to admit, I really beat my old Scotts. It still runs great though. Has a Kohler motor which I have always been partial to. But the deck is beat the heck. I got a great deal on it about 6 seasons ago because per the original owner, it needed new spindles. I mowed with it for a season making lots of deck roaring and figured I would replace the spindles for the following season. During the fall months, I removed the deck to rebuild it. Found the spindles just fine. The roaring was coming from the spindle brake rod mount was broken and it was up under the one spindle rubbing the pulley, which was the source of all the roaring. it really wasn't rubbing hard enough to damage the pulley, I assume it was just so much noise because the deck becoming a bell of sorts and a big sound chamber amplifying the roar from that mount. I just made a new bracket put it all back together and used it regularly up to this past season. But, I really didn't take care of the deck, even though I did maintain the motor religiously. The deck is still good, just needs the guard section under the shield welded, or re-fabricated (broke it sliding it up on a garden bolder). And the blades are bent to heck. It may need new spindles by now, but I may rebuild the deck this spring. But, the old Scotts has been retired after this past season. I plan to remove the deck and the bride is going to use it solely for toting around her garden wagon, and cruising the property picking up debris etc. It's retired from cutting other than a simple back up mower. I replaced it for the heavy work with the Hustler ZTR. Really needed a ZTR anyway because we have a lot of trees, and the bride has several aesthetic gardens scattered around the front of the property. So, the ZTR will certainly be easier to navigate through the maze of landscaping. My Scotts did not have a foot control for the hydro, it is a hand operated lever on the right side, which is better for me anyway. I am 6'5" @ 375# and always had a hard time operating foot controls in cramped leg room, so the hand control has always worked better for me. The Scotts has proved to be a really good, reliable mower.

 

[Boobala]

I have to admit, I really beat my old Scotts. It still runs great though. Has a Kohler motor which I have always been partial to. But the deck is beat the heck. I got a great deal on it about 6 seasons ago because per the original owner, it needed new spindles. I mowed with it for a season making lots of deck roaring and figured I would replace the spindles for the following season. During the fall months, I removed the deck to rebuild it. Found the spindles just fine. The roaring was coming from the spindle brake rod mount was broken and it was up under the one spindle rubbing the pulley, which was the source of all the roaring. it really wasn't rubbing hard enough to damage the pulley, I assume it was just so much noise because the deck becoming a bell of sorts and a big sound chamber amplifying the roar from that mount. I just made a new bracket put it all back together and used it regularly up to this past season. But, I really didn't take care of the deck, even though I did maintain the motor religiously. The deck is still good, just needs the guard section under the shield welded, or re-fabricated (broke it sliding it up on a garden bolder). And the blades are bent to heck. It may need new spindles by now, but I may rebuild the deck this spring. But, the old Scotts has been retired after this past season. I plan to remove the deck and the bride is going to use it solely for toting around her garden wagon, and cruising the property picking up debris etc. It's retired from cutting other than a simple back up mower. I replaced it for the heavy work with the Hustler ZTR. Really needed a ZTR anyway because we have a lot of trees, and the bride has several aesthetic gardens scattered around the front of the property. So, the ZTR will certainly be easier to navigate through the maze of landscaping. My Scotts did not have a foot control for the hydro, it is a hand operated lever on the right side, which is better for me anyway. I am 6'5" @ 375# and always had a hard time operating foot controls in cramped leg room, so the hand control has always worked better for me. The Scotts has proved to be a really good, reliable mower.

In my HIGHLY respected, un-doubted, indisputable, extremely-reputable, world renowned, totally unquestioned, much sought-after, uncontested, supremely reliable, opinion ... THE OLDER MOWERS were the BEST !!!! ..:laughing:..:laughing:..:laughing:

 

[Tudorp]

I have to totally agree with that. My best mower I ever owned, and if not for my sister loosing it, was a 1969 IH Cub Cadet. Cast iron Kohler 12hp motor, hydro transaxel, was bullet proof. I loved that mower. Tough as nails. When I moved to California due to a head hunter offering me a great opportunity there, left my IH with her to use on her 5 acre lot. Yards in Cali you could mow with a weed eater (very small yards). She sold her place a few years later, and unbeknownst to me, LEFT my IH there for the new owner. I did not learn about that until she moved, and I relocated back to "property" and asked her about it. I was miffed, because I loved that little tractor. Another love of mine that I sold awhile back was a vintage WheelHorse. That thing was also bullet proof. They just don't make em like they used to. In fact, they engineer failure into products these days that they didn't decades ago. Back then, they built things to last a lifetime.

 

[bertsmobile1]

It is the result of a capitalist economy where the "market" gets driven by sales.
To work properly the capitalist system assumes that consumers can make an informed decision on all of their purchases.
As "work" went indoors and became something we did with out heads & not hands we lost the ability to evaluate our purchases becoming uninformed.
An uninformed market is driven either by price or status and price is the bigger driving force.
Thus whoever made the slightly cheaper mower got the sales and volume kept the profits reasonable.
However each & every season the mowers get cheaper, the profit margin get squeezed so corners get cut.
Thus none of the domestic mowers are worth while buying.
If you think back, that old IH Cub cost about 1/2 what a small 4 cylinder car cost.
Now days they are cheaper than a good pushbike.
So there is nothing out there that will run for as long or as well as your old IH.
If I can only make $ 200 gross profit from a mower then I need you to keep buying new ones so nothing I make will last very long.

People call me all sorts of names because they come here asking which mower under $ 2000 is the better value and they get angry when they get told, none of them they are all rubbish.