spi Posted July 26, 2019 Posted July 26, 2019 A little over a year ago I bought a pile of simplicity stuff a Tiller, 3 snow blowers, 4 decks, other odds and ends, and 2 ftds. PO said the one tractor had low compression and didn't start well. I stripped tractor for parts and the engine set under the bench for quite a while. Yesterday with a project in mind I checked the compression and indeed it was low. The plenum was full of mouse hotel so I figured the PO had over heated it and softened the rings leading to the low compression. I pulled the engine apart and everything looked good. Rings looked new, cylinder looked good, bearing surfaces looked almost pristine. I reassembled it and still had real low compression. I doused it with soapy water while cranking it over and no visible leaks. Well, with nothing to loose I checked spark and there was. So hooked up a tank put a little gas into the cylinder and cranked it over. IT STARTED RIGHT UP and ran. I was happy but still scratching my head last night when I went on line to research and watched Zippos video about comp. testing these cast iron briggs. Who would have guessed that you need to spin them backward to do an accurate compression test. It looks like the previous owner replaced the rings , still had low compression and gave up. I'm thinking this engine might just be okay. 6
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