The carburetor on the Massey 65 was leaking all over the place after I parked it the last outing. I guess everything is in a state of decay, just some show it a lot more than others. Having never worked on a carburetor before, I did what I usually do, ordered some parts off Amazon. If it’s complicated there is probably a YouTube video that will show me how to fix. There is also two others that show me how to fix it incorrectly and give bad advice, but learning from failure is a powerful tool. It was a fairly easy process in the end and I just had to replace the gaskets to get it running much better than before. More time was spent getting it off the tractor than was needed to do the work. It also gave me chance to wipe of the gunk and know for sure what model of carb it is, a TSX-695, for my future reference.
My grandfather served in WWII as part of a mechanics unit and ran the shop. When I’m working on that kind of stuff I think him. I think about all the complex technology pieces I work on in the cloud these days, and how I sit there and look at these mechanical pieces and try to figure them out. While it would probably be nothing for him. Knowing how it all works together and what to tune to get the best performance or what can be done to just get things to work so folks can carry on. Two engineers from different times.
I managed to get about two acres mowed in under a couple hours. This include driving back up to the house to replace a shear bolt (another item I didn’t know existed until this year) and the muffler getting pulled off when I took out a honey locust tree. Those trees are my bane, every time I take one out there is some sort of repercussion for doing so. I dream of a time when they are not on my property or I have figured out how to live with them.
Mowing is one of those feel good things. I go out there and the vegetation can be 4-5ft high and it looks like you aren’t doing much as you make a few passes around the outside. Eventually you start to a pretty wide swath around the outside and it feel like you are getting somewhere. Slowly the middle area reduces until you can start to see the other side. It’s just a few more passes and then you’ll have this beautiful open area. Which is normally when the tractor/mower/weed-eater give out. Not today though, I got it all done an it looked great in the end. That’s 2 acres down, only 25 or so more to go. Might need to get something bigger than a 5ft brush hog.