Nope. You read that right. Never changed it. If I did, it was so long ago that I forgot. I'm on my third battery, though. :laughing: I've just never had any problems with the thing. It almost always starts, with the exception of under zero degrees, when I sometimes have to give it a shot of starting fluid.
I'm also on my original spark plugs. I have spares, but never changed them yet. Maybe this summer.
I'm somewhere around 5-600 hours in 12 years. I avearage about 1.5 gallons per hour. Maybe a tad less.
I have 3 six gallon cans of gas that I rotate, putting 4 gallons in the tractor at each fill. In the summer, I go through about a gallon per week mowing. Harvesting firewood 4-5 weekends per year, I go through 5-6 gallons per weekend. Snow plowing is rare. So, 25 gallons for mowing, 25 gallons for firewood, and maybe 15-20 gallons for brush hogging/special projects depending on who asks. That adds up to about 75 gallons per year at most. So, about 800 gallons through the filter in 12 years is my best guess. Doesn't sound like that much when you add it all up. I do use stabilizer in my 3 cans but only in the fall when all brush hogging, firewood, mowing and leaf cleanup is done. Those three cans can sit all winter if there is no snow. That's about the only thing I do special.
Personally, I think people get overly worried about fuel contamination(I'm talking about gasoline, not diesel). If you rotate out your fuel on a regular basis, run your tanks down, run your small 2 stroke engines out completely, and if you have to store gas more than 6 months, use a stabilizer, keep your filler area clean as well as your gas can nozzles, you should be fine.
It's worked for me. :thumbsup:
