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Yeah, I have an old Farmall Super-C, 1954 model, and a sickle bar mower for it, along with some other "stuff" like a fence post hole digger. I agree, these simple old tractors work and work, if you change the oil once a year, maybe put a set of plugs in, check/adjust the points or even replace them - I think this tractor has a decent chance of outliving me!
For my yard full of trees and other "stuff" though, the Super C is too big, and the ag-style tractor tires screw up the grass. I don't want to put "city" tires on it, I do use it in my pastures from time to time.
Yeah, I have an old Farmall Super-C, 1954 model, and a sickle bar mower for it, along with some other "stuff" like a fence post hole digger. I agree, these simple old tractors work and work, if you change the oil once a year, maybe put a set of plugs in, check/adjust the points or even replace them - I think this tractor has a decent chance of outliving me!
For my yard full of trees and other "stuff" though, the Super C is too big, and the ag-style tractor tires screw up the grass. I don't want to put "city" tires on it, I do use it in my pastures from time to time.
When I lived in WV me and my friend made hay on 300 acres with a farmall cub, a Super C and a big M. The cub cut it, the Super C raked it and the M baled and hauled it. Good times...
I'm going to put turf tires on our nice cub with the sickle mower. I'm shopping around for an original IH belly mower to put on it. We only have to cut twice a year here in Montana- all dry land field grass..
We're going to have a bit of small lawn around our house (irrigated). That I will cut with a reel mower.. More than likely a Scotts (which I've owned before).
You could resort to avgas, or, buy the True Fuel in the quart cans. At least for storage.
Or, you are a handy guy, set up a rig to separate the "hooch" from pump premium (a tank you can agitate, add enough water to get the ethanol to separate, decant this trash from the bottom, voila, ethanol-free regular (more or less). There are U-Tube videos out there.
Have used True Fuel in a pinch... worked great and ran great.
AV Gas needs a tail number to buy here... at least I was asked to provide one.
I had one when i lived in my first rent house, in my current house I had 4 gas mowers in the 16 years since I lived here, all of my gas mowers were only good for the first 2 years I had them and then 3 - 4 years of taking forever to get them started, reel mowers just work as long as you keep them sharpened and oiled and even that is a once in a blue moon thing. with all my gas mowers maintenance was a constant thing after the 2nd summer of use. and I no longer have to cut my grass in the heat of the day, last night I cut my grass by porch light at 3AM, with a gas mower someone would have called the police lol. but my neighbors saw me cutting last week one mourning and were saying how they hate those things, I'm curious on your opinions.
I dislike them because the ones I've used get hung up on twigs or sticks very easily.
If I already had a manicured lawn, I would be more open to one
Thanks for your input, make me wonder how people with alot of land cut their grass prior to gas mowers existing. I imagine most people only cut their grass within a 30 - 40 radius of their house and a path to the street leaving the rest to grow wild or for growing food. and those who could afford it hired people to do it, gas mowers must have killed a lot of jobs. were today a lawn service may send 3 - 4 people they may have sent 10 - 20 back then.
It used to be cut with a scythe. Users say there is something soothing about the motion. You can still buy them today.
Thanks for your input, make me wonder how people with alot of land cut their grass prior to gas mowers existing. I imagine most people only cut their grass within a 30 - 40 radius of their house and a path to the street leaving the rest to grow wild or for growing food. and those who could afford it hired people to do it, gas mowers must have killed a lot of jobs. were today a lawn service may send 3 - 4 people they may have sent 10 - 20 back then.
I have a reel mower sitting in my garage that I don't use because it doesn't like lumpy lawns, which mine are because I have "farmer lawns" (if it's green, I cut it and forget it). I do extensive flower and veggie gardening, however.
I have a rider to cut the back yard, but I originally bought the reel mower to cut the front as a replacement for my aged Craftsman walk behind that finally bit the dust after 20 years of use and abuse, but it was such a pain to do just the tree lawn out front (the space between the curb and the sidewalk on a 60' wide lot -- the rest of the front "lawn" has been converted to flowers) that after a couple of years I broke down and bought another Craftsman walk behind, this one self-propelled.
I agree that gas mowers aren't particularly hard to deal with, and I'm no mechanical genius. I learned long ago that gas stabilizer is my very best friend, and every can of gas that I buy, gets its allotment as soon as I take it out of the back of the car so it's always ready. Check the oil level. If the oil is gunky, change it. Maybe clean the spark plug (or get a new one) before trying to start it in the spring. Give it a new blade if it needs one. Check/change the air filter. If you're not up to doing that stuff yourself, take it in before the season starts to get it tuned up.
My current walk behind is about 4 or 5 years old. Generally, I have to fight with it a bit the first time I start it in the spring but then it's fine with weekly use. My rider is 18 years old, and outside of maintenance (I don't do that myself) has had a starting harness and a deck belt replaced in all that time.
Advancing age finally forced me to break down and get a rider. Now I'm thinking about building a lawn roller to tow behind it. That's the recipe for those lovely English croquet lawns - roll weekly for 300 years.
If you want to mow grass at 3am by porch light then you go right ahead. Personally I will never touch one of those mowers again. We had to use those when I was a child to cut 1/2 acre and I won't cut 1/2" with one of those.
While it's true that gas mowers have been around since the 1910's they were not in common use until the 1950's and wernt used by the majority until the late 60's early 70's, I'm 45 and I remember seeing a few being used in every neighborhood I lived in until i was 8 or 9, then stopped seeing them all together until the mid 90's and then only the green types, the one I had before I found in the basement of the house I was renting up in ohio, The one I have now is the first one I ever bought.
The first gasoline powered mower I ever used was in the '50s. It was a 2-cycle jobby, and the only 2-cycle oil back then was 16:1 paraffin oil. Once I got it started it ran like a bandit in a huge cloud of blue smoke, screaming along at about 6000 rpm. It was a great improvement over the reel mower or the scythe, both of which were misery tools.
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