wasabi
Platinum Member
At the risk of looking quite foolish and attracting arrows, I have to share our saga of our stubborn mule. She flat out quit a few weeks ago while coming down the trail leading back to the workshop after a run through the woods. We have been diddling with it (I’m too stubborn to haul it to a dealer for (free) warranty service!) for three weekends now.
My very first hit was that we must have snagged a wire (should have listened to myself). All indications were it was not getting gas. I disconnected the hose to the carburetor and sure enough, no gas. Changed the fuel filter….still no gas….checked the air filter….very clean….decided it must be either the fuel pump or the relay, so ordered both and brought them with this weekend, installed one, tested to no avail, installed the other, same thing, cussed a bunch and sat for a minute to ponder……now, I’m an hour into it, gas all over me and in puddles under the unit. At this point I’ve tried everything and still no luck. Very frustrating!. So, I go back over the whole thing with a fine tooth comb and behold, a loose wire on the starter capacitor down at the bottom of the engine. I plug it in, now KNOWING that was the problem. My lovely wife suggests we start it up, but oh no I say, (stubbornly), first I’m going to replace the old, but perfectly fine fuel pump and relay so I can take them back (unused). Finally get that done, button it all back up and crank her over…..she starts right up. Now for the SAGA part…..
This is a low hour engine that was running great when it suddenly stopped…..now it sounds like a cement mixer! Frantically, I shut it down, fearing the worst, but clueless as to how this could possibly occur. After a couple of minutes checking around, convinced I dropped a wrench in the wrong place or something, I come to the conclusion that it must be something else. Carefully, I instruct me wif to crank it over but be prepared to turn it right off. She fires it up while I’m huddled under the tilt bed, listening and watching for anything that might explain this. It coughs, catches, and proceeds to rattle like it is coming apart at the seams. Then, flying out of the exhaust port from the torque converter I see chunks of dog food! Not a piece or two, I’m talking about a steady stream. Seems some rodent found the private entry, great room, food storage space and protection from the weather irresistible and he moved in with all the food he could carry!!
An hour or so later, after taking apart the housing, clearing out said rodent’s stash and reassembling, it fires up, but now has absolutely no acceleration. Check all linkage, go back through every possible known dog food or branch related issue, to no avail. Now, I’m really pissed, but it is too late to finish. To dinner we go.
Finally, the next morning, after removing the carburetor cover I find a small linkage arm has popped off its stub, probably from my wife’s frantic pedal pumping attemts to start it…we pop it back on and we’re off and running.
All in all, the better part of a day saga, most of it at the expense of a rodent invasion!
All orfices on said mule now closed with steel wool to prevent further invasions, but we’re still getting cats!
My very first hit was that we must have snagged a wire (should have listened to myself). All indications were it was not getting gas. I disconnected the hose to the carburetor and sure enough, no gas. Changed the fuel filter….still no gas….checked the air filter….very clean….decided it must be either the fuel pump or the relay, so ordered both and brought them with this weekend, installed one, tested to no avail, installed the other, same thing, cussed a bunch and sat for a minute to ponder……now, I’m an hour into it, gas all over me and in puddles under the unit. At this point I’ve tried everything and still no luck. Very frustrating!. So, I go back over the whole thing with a fine tooth comb and behold, a loose wire on the starter capacitor down at the bottom of the engine. I plug it in, now KNOWING that was the problem. My lovely wife suggests we start it up, but oh no I say, (stubbornly), first I’m going to replace the old, but perfectly fine fuel pump and relay so I can take them back (unused). Finally get that done, button it all back up and crank her over…..she starts right up. Now for the SAGA part…..
This is a low hour engine that was running great when it suddenly stopped…..now it sounds like a cement mixer! Frantically, I shut it down, fearing the worst, but clueless as to how this could possibly occur. After a couple of minutes checking around, convinced I dropped a wrench in the wrong place or something, I come to the conclusion that it must be something else. Carefully, I instruct me wif to crank it over but be prepared to turn it right off. She fires it up while I’m huddled under the tilt bed, listening and watching for anything that might explain this. It coughs, catches, and proceeds to rattle like it is coming apart at the seams. Then, flying out of the exhaust port from the torque converter I see chunks of dog food! Not a piece or two, I’m talking about a steady stream. Seems some rodent found the private entry, great room, food storage space and protection from the weather irresistible and he moved in with all the food he could carry!!
An hour or so later, after taking apart the housing, clearing out said rodent’s stash and reassembling, it fires up, but now has absolutely no acceleration. Check all linkage, go back through every possible known dog food or branch related issue, to no avail. Now, I’m really pissed, but it is too late to finish. To dinner we go.
Finally, the next morning, after removing the carburetor cover I find a small linkage arm has popped off its stub, probably from my wife’s frantic pedal pumping attemts to start it…we pop it back on and we’re off and running.
All in all, the better part of a day saga, most of it at the expense of a rodent invasion!
All orfices on said mule now closed with steel wool to prevent further invasions, but we’re still getting cats!
