Suffolk super punch wont start

[Paul434]

Hi all ,
Brand new to the forum and hoping I might be able to get some help with a suffolk super punch 17" ball bearing mower I felt sorry for at an auction and couldnt leave there ( starting to wish I had !) .
My issue is that it wont start , no spark . Have changed the spark plug for a new champion J8C , cleaned and gapped the points but still nothing . I have attempted to meter out the points to ht lead . I get 1ohm across the points when they are open and 4.95kohms if I meter from the end of the HT lead to the points. I have no idea if this is correct or not. I have changed the cap on the end of the ht lead as there was no resistance at all on the old one . The new one has a 1k resistor inside it and it does read 1k across the cap and adds 1k to the overall resistance if I measure from end of ht lead to points with the cap v's without it. I am at a bit of a loss as to what to try next so any advice would be much appreciated. I have no idea how old this machine is ( but would love to know ) but my guess is it could be older than me and it seems such a shame to see it thrown on a skip when it appears to have been pretty well loved throughout its life.
Thanks in advance for any help you can give
Will attach some pics if I can figure out how .....keeps telling me the file is too large

[Mick]

Hi Paul, and welcome to TGMF.

Sorry about the image size stuff, the max size for each attachment is 2048KB or around 2MB.  Some pics of the stator assembly on your machine would be handy to see exactly what we're dealing dealing with, so if you could resize them it would be great.  If you don't have a image program you can normally find a free online resizer for this job.

[Paul434]

Hi and thanks for the welcome ..... so , update is , I tore the side of the engine apart again this afternoon and had another look. I took the points off and had a closer inspection and there appeared to be pitting on the contact faces of the points. So , out with some more emery cloth and cleaned the points again . With them off was able to inspect more closely and got them nice and bright .... Put it all back together and put the plug on the top of the block , pulled the start rope and get a spark 👍🏻. Spark plug in , and gave it a try and it tried to start ..... bit more fiddling with the choke and mix and away she went 😃.Turns out these are really touchy about the point surface being super clean.
So thats the first hurdle done, need a bit of a tune and then see if I can get it actually cutting grass .
Will try and get some pics on soon
Thanks

[Mick]

Cool, sounds like you're making progress.  The points are very fussy on any machine to be fair, they need to be spotless.  I always make sure to close the points and slide a piece of clean paper between them to give them a final wipe. 

Look forward to seeing the pics. 

[Paul434]

Hoping this will work . This is how it was from the auction.. apart from me playing with trying to get a spark . If anyone has an idea of age I would be interested . Is there a way to tell age from the chassis no ?

Thanks again in advance

Paul

[Paul434]

Here's another

[Mick]

I'm not sure of the exact date this was made if being honest. Lovely old machines though, built like a tank.  I suspect it's had some modern parts fitted though as the years went on, like front rollers, starter and cup, and exhaust.

Used to work on these when I first started out around 46 years ago.

[Paul434]

Hi ,
So had another go at starting it today and I struggled . It tried a couple of times but then died . I still have a spark but the plug is wet with fuel so I think its flooding it . I stripped the carb off and gave it all a good clean . The air intake foam filter sheet was almost solid and just crumbled to dust when I took it off so have ordered a replacement sheet to cut a new one then will have another go. Anyone know of a good youtube of how to tune one of these motors with a zenith carb on it ?
Also Im yet to work out how the roller drive on this works , there is a lever on the right side of the drive case which from the manual you are supposed to be able to move to engage the drive . Mine doesnt appear to move . Have tried to get into the case but two of the three screws are stuck . Have sprayed with wd to see if they will free up a bit

Thanks in advance

Paul