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Collection, Preservation and Display of Old Lawn Mowers

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Atco Commodore B14Dear OLC, thanks for letting me join as i felt i owed your site & forums at least some fees for the information available on here! I purchased an Atco Commodore B14 for £20 on eBay with no idea on where to start. After trawling through your forum threads & pages it informed me not to strip everything down as i was assured it had ran before. The spark plug cap was missing so i was kindly offered one by a friend. Before that arrived i removed the flywheel & cleaned the points, then fitted the cap, hey presto we had a spark! After several attempts at starting with no luck i cleaned the carb in situ by removing screws & the air box. It still would not start. When i checked more closely i saw the fuel was not flowing, so after a bit more cleaning & inspection, i was about to remove the carb to give it a proper strip down. As a last attempt i put my hand over the air intake whilst turning the engine over, finally it fired up & ran. So thanks again for all your info. I've just got to work out how to stop it cutting out off of choke & do some adjustments to the blade & running gear, but all the clutch drive & blades work fine & so far have managed to cut the grass twice. Next i have lined up my dads suffolk punch & i am thinking wether to buy a Ransomes Typhoon I've spotted

wristpin Wed, 05/04/2017

Welcome to the forum. Not sure about cleaning the points, it's my belief that engine was only ever made with electronic ignition - no contact breaker points.  Perhaps you gave the coil pole pieces a polish? Your Dad's Suffolk may well have points though - depends on age. If the flywheel has either a metal or plastic "window" it will have points. If not, it's probably a later one with electronic ignition.

GrassyKnees Wed, 05/04/2017

Correct! My terminology shows my inexperience! The Atco is the later model with belt drive & two chains, & my dads has the coil pole type as well.