Re: MTD Yardman Transaxle Rebuild
I would have thought that trimers & blowers would be even cheaper in the USA than down here.
I charge $ 45 + parts for all hand helds, except chain saws which are $ 60 + parts.
On those rates I actually loose about $ 50 on every one I do but they tend to come in when not much else is happening.
Down here Westfarmers have around 80% of the total hard wear market and their retail store ( Bunnings ) will sell it's house brand trimmer from $ 50.
Discount tool shops ( HF equivalent ) sell cheap Chinese ones for around the same price.
Stihl sells their Chinese made ones for $ 99 with 12 month warranty
Husqvarna sells their Chinese made ones from $ 75 also with 12 month warranty
Ryobi, who flog their stuff on TV endlessly sell theirs starting at $ 95.
Going to the big shops and buying a new one is exciting & fun ( to some ) and owning a brand new one is ego inflating to most.
Taking one to a shop for repair means it will be there for at least 1 week and has no glamour attached to it.
Because new total garbage trimers are so cheap used one sell for very low prices.
Being I am a repairer I am obliged to give 6 month warranty on used stuff that could very well cost more in parts ( they are stupid prices down here ) than I get for it used.
All of he retail outlets are all franchises of one sort or another and go to great lengths to convince any one who walks through the doors than all used machines are junk.
Most will not trade in and none sell used equipment.
This is also made worse but the auto market who spend a fortune convincing people that used car are all trash, particularly in covert payments to locally made TV shows and advertising agencies to feature problematic used things.
So the new = winner, used = looser mentality is very strongly established down here.
Then there is my experience.
Most of the domestic stuff I have looked at was trash, lucky to get past the compulsory 12 month warranty period.
You probably get better stuff over there but all of the Homelite , Ryobi, Craftsman, Talon, Sanly and the like stuff I have put a spannar on was not worth fixing, save the ones left with full carbs and gummed up.
When I first took over I had ideas of restoring older mowers over winter and flogging them off in summer.
And I could if I had an endless supply of $ 10 push mowers and $ 50 ride ons to sell.
To an extent I put those prices down to all the EWE Toob videos of the $ 10 tractor that worked perfectly after they put in a new plug, so idiot Aussies think there are millions of the same here.
Three seasons on and I have learned it is a better use of my time to strip them down for scrap than to attempt to repair and sell running.
Same story with push mowers made $ 3000 clean from scrap sales last season, so apart from ignition modules those trimmers, blowers & chain saws are all going to Simmetal.
And the HDPE is off the the plastic recyclers where I get $ 5 / kg colour sorted or $ 3/ kg mixed colours.
