Bought new in 1987, used to cut .33 acres for the last 21 years, started burning some oil in the last couple of years but ALWAYS started on the first pull, never broke down and never needed service beyond blade sharpening and yearly spark plug/oil change.

A neighbor who was moving into a retirement community was nice enough to give me a '95 Honda mower, with the commercial engine... SWEET!

So, hoping for the best, (Autumn is not a great time to sell motorcycles, boats or lawn equipment) I stuck the '87 on Craigslist for $50...

I got 3 emails within 30 minutes and it was sold in 45 minutes!?!

Dang, should have asked for $100... Is this the Mercedes of lawn mowers??

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Cheers,
Robert

Honda is the Honda of lawn mowers. Their small engines can't be beat, and are priced accordingly.

Have you looked at what they command new lately?

Our framer has a compressor thats run by a littler Honda engine, probably 5hp or so. They typicaly last 6-8 years and actualy the compressor starts to fail before the engine. His last engine is currantly on his kits go kart. Anyway he doesn't do any maintenace, zero, not even an oil change. Just adds oil when it gets low.

He only takes two weeks off a year, so it conservativly runs 30 hours a week 50 weeks a year, so 1,500 hours a year. The one on his kids go cart did that for 8 years. 12,000 hours! Without so much as an oil change!

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1999 SL500
1969 280SE
2023 Ram 1500
2007 Tiara 3200

IMO, Snappers are the best, they last forever. Although the Briggs & Strattion motors are kinda hard to start every now and then if they aren't kept up properly.

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1985 300TD Turbo Euro-wagon
1979 280CE 225,200 miles
1985 300D Turbo 264,000 miles
1976 240D 190,000 miles
1979 300TD 220,000

GONE but not forgotten
1976 300D 195,300 miles
1983 300D Turbo 175,000 miles

http://i42.photobucket.com/albums/e3...e485-1-2-1.jpg

I always used Toro mowers when I was a kid, but I bought a Honda in a pawnshop 8-9 years ago, have mowed my subdivision-size lawn with no mechanical problems during that time, finally changed the oil and cleaned out the air filter this year. I've never been wild about the quality of the cut, it leaves stray blades of grass standing up, but it always runs.

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2002 Ford ZX2
2 x 2013 Honda Civics

Thanks you guys for replying to my sad cry for help, I've got no Benzes anymore, so I'm grasping @ anything with an engine for solace.


Ummm... we had a Jacobson mower before the Honda, it had a B&S engine, it burned an exhaust valve after only 7 years.

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Cheers,
Robert

I have a Lawn-Boy that was handed down to me by my dad. It is a little finicky at times and doesn't quite run all that well until it is warm. I called in the serial number and it was built in '84. It has never been apart for rings or otherwise.

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'85 300SD (formerly california emissions)
'08 Chevy Tahoe
'93 Ducati 900 SS
'79 Kawasaki KZ 650
'86 Kawasaki KX 250
'88 Kawasaki KDX200
'71 Hodaka Ace 100
'72 Triumph T100R

Well I have my 18 year old Simplicity Rider, with the Briggs 12hp engine.
I mow my acre lawn SEVERAL (emphasized because it's a pain, and I'm the idiot that fertilizes regularly) at least once a week, 8 months a years. This year closer to twice a week to keep up.
It also gets a good workout doing many additional chores. Plugger, aerator, sweeper, thatcher, spreader and a Snowblower for the winter. Even used to have a trailer for moving stuff around.

Still chugging along, beat up, burns oil, runs like a champ. The dealer was trying to convince me to buy a new one. I'm into keeping things running till it's not worth it.
Well a new carb a couple of years ago, a new starter last year and actually a spare car battery WOW runs great, starts right up.

But for most of it's life, even now for the most part, regular maintenance.
2 or 3 Oil changes a year, greased regularly, blades sharpened, cleaned and general checkout with each use.

Thats the point, regular maintenance.

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KLK, MCSE

1990 500SL

I was always taught to respect my elders.
I don't have to respect too many people anymore.

Used to like old Lawn Boys back when they had very light Magnesium-alloy decks, but those were fragile, and the two-stroke engines can be tempermental.

So I've been using a cheap B&S powered Murray my next-door neighbor pitched out, until this summer, when a neighborhood kid gave me an old (probably 20 year) Honda mower with the red commercial HR-215 pushrod OHV engine.
He salvaged it from the backyard of some forclosed property. Engine was stuck, bottom oil-seal was blown out, and had no oil. Started to dissassemble until the engine turned with a socket-wrench on the flywheel bolt, so I replaced the seal, added oil, including some in the sparkplug hole, and cranked it till it smoothed out. Filled it with gas and it started on the second pull. Runs great - Amazing!
Tonight I picked up it's younger brother from a friend that's moving. He removed the pull-starter for repair, then lost it. Seems to have the same HR-215 OHV engine as the older one except the red engine-cover is plastic instead of steel. Haven't tried to get it going yet. It's still in back of my 300TD.
I also have a Huskvarna with the current black OHC Honda 'consumer' engine.
Bought it with no compression, for $10 from the same kid that gave me the first Honda. Turned out to have a stuck exhaust valve. Spent a half hour getting this one going. Runs good too, though I'm amazed the camshaft is plastic and the timing belt runs in oil! Still, Huskvarna and the local mower-shop insist there's no timing-belt service requirement. We'll see which mower holds up best.

Happy Motoring, Mark

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DrDKW

My dad runs M1 5w40 turbo diesel truck oil in his mower.....it runs very quiet and smooth. Its a 4 year old 5.5HP Briggs engine.....I change the oil once a season......it does maybe 150 hours a year.........still runs great. Though at the begining of the season this year it needed the carb pulled apart and cleaned....simple fix. I also increased the stupid Californicated emissions-tree-hugger-governed engine speed from "help me I can barely cut through grass" speed, to "Shred small trees" speed like the older mowers run at...improved it massively.

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-diesel is not just a fuel, its a way of life-
'15 GLK250 Bluetec 118k - mine - (OC-123,800)
'17 Metris(VITO!) - 37k - wifes (OC-41k)
'09 Sprinter 3500 Winnebago View - 62k (OC - 67k)
'13 ML350 Bluetec - 95k - dad's (OC-98k)
'01 SL500 - 103k(km) - dad's (OC-110,000km)
'16 E400 4matic Sedan - 148k - Brothers (OC-155k)

I bought my Honda HRA216 a little over 12 years ago. I had no idea at the time how old it already was; I think I've read since then that the model was introduced in 1986.

It was - and still is - a really solid piece of machinery. According to the manual, the dry weight is just shy of 117 lb!

I have a Honda genset in India which has done 10 years of hard duty in open 45C sun and till today, no engine work nothing. It has run for 16 hours stretch in hot weather under full load, sometimes it had to run almost every two days like that. My hats off to this wonderful piece of engineering.

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99 Gurkha with OM616 IDI turbo

2015 Gurkha with OM616 DI turbo

2014 Rexton W with OM612 VGT

I have 3 old Lawn-Boy 2 cycle mowers (one I keep at my Mom's house to mow her grass). Two of them are the end-of the line Duraforce 6.5 hp, one is an earlier (rare) M-series I bought for $10 that needs a lot of wheel bearing work. These are kind of the 240D equivalent of lawnmowers- few moving parts- lots of smoke. Like my rides, I have enough to last my lifetime.

Rick

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80 300SD (129k mi) 82 240D stick (193k mi)77 240D auto - stick to be (153k mi) 85 380SL (145k mi) 89 BMW 535i 82 Diesel Rabbit Pickup (374k mi) 91 Jetta IDI Diesel (155k mi) 81 VW Rabbit Convertible Diesel 70 Triumph Spitfire Mk III (63kmi)66 Triumph TR4a IRS (90k mi)67 Ford F-100 (??)

Any push mower that I've owned has never lasted more than a year. Lets start with this year and you'll see why.

Back in the spring, bought a new push mower as ours was trashed from the season before. Well that lasted until June when the wife hit a clearly visible tree root bending the crank then blamed it on us not having a weed eater. You're already realizing why our mowers get trashed. I refused to buy another mower so she buys this high dollar mower from Sears with the Honda engine. Used that mower 5 times before the crank got bent on it. This time it was ME but before you die laughing you have to know what happened. This mower had a sturdy flap on the back of the deck [which I should have taken off] and I was dragging it up and down the bank when the flap got caught on the blade sucking the whole flap under the deck, bending the crank. Since it self destructed, Sears repaired it under warranty. We get it back and my 14 year old son takes it and starts trimming. Less than 5 minutes later WHAM. He hits something with it but this time bends the blade sparing the crank. I buy a new blade and proceed to install it. This T shaped thing that goes on the crank under the blade fell off when I took the bent one off. I go to put it back on and long story short it won't and is now stuck half way on the crank and I am unable to get it off or all the way on. Went to an auction and bought a good running 30 year old Craftsman for $15 so now we're using that one. I'll be stocking up on cheap mowers from now on so they can bend as many cranks as they want.

A buddy asked why not put my son on my BX2200 Kubota instead of me doing the mowing. After he heard the crank bending stories he understands why thats not happening. Cheaper for me to do it.

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Cheers,
Bill

Honda makes excellent mowers... also excellent cars and cycles.