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Collection, Preservation and Display of Old Lawn Mowers

Age and Mk of Marquis 51,..... and clutch shoes.

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Hello all,

I have been reading the forums for the last year or so but this is my first post.

As the subject  title says, I would be grateful for some help regarding establishing the age and Mk of my Ransomes Marquis 51 mower. The serial number is K B 00320 and the engine (It appears to be original, but I'm not sure if it is) is a Kubota 130. There are two reasons for wanting to know its age - 1. Curiosity, and 2. I need to establish part numbers.

Long story short(ish) the mower wasnt running or cutting too well last year. Rather than slave on with the pitiful 14" electric mower all this summer, I decided to strip down the whole machine, service it and give it a good clean up. I also cleaned the cylinder and back lapped it. Before reassembling everything again I fired up the engine. Whilst I'm no expert, I am fairly practical and competent - I tend to do a lot of prep reading before attacking a project. Thankfully I read on this forum about removing the clutch shoes so that they don't fly off and break/cause injury. Having removed the shoes I fired up the (fixed down) engine and it seemed to run really well - quiet, smoothly and with no high revving which it had been doing prior to my intervention. Unfortunately, my four year old son had been paying a lot of attention and, when I switched the engine off, he ran to fetch the clutch shoes to help reassemble them. He picked them up, ran over and then tripped over. The shoes went flying and I now need two new ones - both broke on landing.

On the one hand I'm chuffed that he's interested in how things go together and likes tinkering. On the other, I'm gutted that the shoes are broken and I have no idea if I can find a replacement, and how much it might cost. That said, its going to have to be a lot to make me chose the electric over fixing the old girl.

If anyone is able to shed any light on the above I'd be truly grateful. Maybe then my son and I can have a project to rebuild it over the winter.

Kind regards,

Matt.

Forums

hortimech Thu, 06/10/2016

Oh dear, they do love to help ;-)

You are probably better off than you think, for as far as I am aware, the centrifugal clutch never changed, so you just need to search for a second hand pair on you know where. The same clutch was used on Marquis and Auto-certes machines. Hopefully this will make your search easier, as I don't think you will want to pay for new clutch shoes

kwiffboy Fri, 07/10/2016

Good morning Hortimech.

Thank you for the quick reply.

Good news that it is likely a standard part. As you say, if just one clutch type was used, I should have a reasonable chance of finding a second hand set of shoes. I'll keep looking and see what comes of it.

Many thanks.

Matt.

hillsider Fri, 07/10/2016

I am a bit puzzled by what has broken on you're clutch shoes as I recall them as being rather solid lumps. Very unfortunate for both to break, hope you're apprentice was ok?