figbat
Slippery scientist
- Location
- South Oxfordshire, UK
I have got an old strimmer in the shed; it has been there for years and last time I tried to use it I failed due to it not starting and peeing fuel everywhere. Well, after no-mow May we decided to leave the lawn to become a wildlife meadow and haven't mown it at all, other than a couple of paths through it so we can access certain areas easily. Now that most of the flowering is over it's time to tackle it and the strimmer is the obvious choice.
I pulled it out yesterday to see what's what. It's a Kawasaki TG20D engine mounted to a generic strimmer pole through a centrifugal clutch and four bolt flange. Undoing the four bolts and disconnecting the engine-stop switch removes the engine from the strimmer - once in my garage I took the carb off, cleaned it up, tightened the bolts holding the priming bulb (the most likely cause of the fuel leakage), cleaned the spark plug, put it back together, mixed up a fresh batch of fuel and after two pulls it fired up and ran perfectly. I need a new air filter as the one that was in it had largely crumbled and disappeared (presumably through the engine) but for the purposes of checking it worked I ran without one briefly.
However, in researching parts for the engine it seems it's a generic power plant for bolting to whatever needs power. Any suggestions as to thing I can bolt to it? I thought about, for example, a water pump, leaf blower, compressor or alternator but can't find if the four bolt flange is a standard mounting or not (90° spacing around an 82mm BCD). I'll admit I also considered mounting it to a bicycle but that's not really my style. It's only 0.7 hp anyway so not going to set the world alight (unless that leak comes back). I'd love to find a way of using the engine more, rather than once in a blue moon (although now it's running I'll use the strimmer more often for tidying edges etc).
I pulled it out yesterday to see what's what. It's a Kawasaki TG20D engine mounted to a generic strimmer pole through a centrifugal clutch and four bolt flange. Undoing the four bolts and disconnecting the engine-stop switch removes the engine from the strimmer - once in my garage I took the carb off, cleaned it up, tightened the bolts holding the priming bulb (the most likely cause of the fuel leakage), cleaned the spark plug, put it back together, mixed up a fresh batch of fuel and after two pulls it fired up and ran perfectly. I need a new air filter as the one that was in it had largely crumbled and disappeared (presumably through the engine) but for the purposes of checking it worked I ran without one briefly.
However, in researching parts for the engine it seems it's a generic power plant for bolting to whatever needs power. Any suggestions as to thing I can bolt to it? I thought about, for example, a water pump, leaf blower, compressor or alternator but can't find if the four bolt flange is a standard mounting or not (90° spacing around an 82mm BCD). I'll admit I also considered mounting it to a bicycle but that's not really my style. It's only 0.7 hp anyway so not going to set the world alight (unless that leak comes back). I'd love to find a way of using the engine more, rather than once in a blue moon (although now it's running I'll use the strimmer more often for tidying edges etc).
