The old Woods zero radius turn mower did a bad thing last week. Whilst mowing, I noticed a few puffs of bluish white smoke in the exhaust. About 15 minutes later, power was down and I almost didn't get back to the shop.
I fiddled with the carburetor which didn't help. I thought about head gasket problem, since it's common problem with Briggs and Stratton, but after swapping them out and getting back to full compression, the engine was not better. It would run, but wouldn't power the drive system AND the mower deck. At that point, I decided to put a new motor in.
The old unit was a 1994 12.5 HP Briggs and Stratton Vanguard motor. That size is no longer available, so I took a chance and got a 16 HP unit, hoping it wouldn't be too big for the application.
This is the old motor on the bench.

Here's the motorless mower:

Here's the new engine when it arrived:

I had to remove the keyed shaft off the flywheel side and replace it with fan and drive shaft off the old motor. After a bit of adjusting and resealing the exhaust system, it was time to test it out. The new set works great.

The resurrected Mower:
