# 20" McLane reel mower restoration



## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

I picked up a cheap mower off of Craigslist and it's got some issues so I'm tearing it down and restoring it.













































So I started taking it apart to see how it looked inside. I picked up this idea a while back but you get a multi-compartment hardware organizer and label each bucket and then write down what goes in which bucket

















Pressed out all of the bearings for the handles and levers









Started stripping all of the paint with Citristrip









Got the first round of parts mostly paint free, and took care of the heavy rust. I still have to do the mower deck, the other side plate, the bed knife, and the stuff for the drive wheels. I'm not sure if I'm going to do the reel right now or not.









I found out that all of the bearings I looked at are shot: flanged side bearings for the axle and the bearings that the drive wheel carriage mounts to. I'm going to pull the reel side plates and check those bearings but they'll probably get replaced. One of the axle bearings was siezed and had worn the rear axle down. I don't have access to a lathe or a welder currently so I'll probably have to order a new axle from McLane. The problem with that is that my mower's obviously old and the only axle I can find is for mowers after 1991 which apparently went to a different design for the rear axle. It looks like the axle goes into supports similar to what the reel does and it's adjustable up and down whereas mine's not. It also needs new drive wheels

I picked up some Rustoleum primer and some Safety Red and Safety Yellow so over the next few weeks I'll be prepping and painting it bit by bit. I haven't decided if I'm going to brush it on or spray it on with a HVLP gun which I've never done before. I'll probably test brushing the color on something and seeing how it turns out as far as texture goes.

Feedback welcome!


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## SGrabs33 (Feb 13, 2017)

Looking forward to seeing how this progresses!


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Got the rest of the parts gooped up and the stripper is doing its work









The grass shield is too far gone to be repaired, I believe. There's tons of holes in it and the fingers at the bottom are super fragile from rust. I'm debating on what I should do about it. There's a Craftsman reel mower that seems to be in good shape nearby for a decent price and I'm thinking about picking it up for spares. 









Next I'll be doing a lot of detail work with smaller wire wheels to prep everything for the primer. Good thing my yard's crappy right now so I don't need this mower and can keep using my rotary for a while


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## jdpber (Mar 19, 2019)

looking forward to seeing the results


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

This has majorly stalled  When I had time to work on it I ended up putting a chisel through my thumb and had to get stitched up which stopped this. I found a Craftsman reel that was in better shape than this one and I'm using it while working on this one.

I'm toying with the idea of converting it to be battery powered. I could make the control system have the ability to run it backward at backlapping speed without having to take anything apart. I'm soliciting help from my robotics friends on ideas of where I could find/scavenge parts so we'll see where this goes.


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## Francoix (May 16, 2019)

Ouch with the chisel. I am looking forward to seeing the finish product. If you go battery powered, how big of a battery would you use?


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

I'm not sure yet. I have to work backward from the motor requirements


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

The first order of business was finding out the current state of things with the pulleys/clutch/jackshaft so I orderd a phototachometer. It uses a laser and a reflective trigger on the object you're testing to measure how many time it "sees" a reflection to figure out rotational speed. I tried using just white paint marker at first but it wasn't happy with the reflective pulley so I used reflective tape. I measured the speed of the crankshaft of the engine and the speed of the jackshaft to check the reduction in the pulley system and it seems to be 2:1







My robotics friend told me he's got some 36V 4.4AH battery packs capable of delivering up to 20A that he'd give me so I'm looking at some electric scooter/bike conversion kits and have found a few options that'll work with that. Those motors are rated for speeds above 3000 RPM so I can skip the deadman clutch/jackshaft completely and use the motor to directly drive the chain since using the reduction above the engine would need to be turning at 6000 RPM (it's not) to match that output. There's a 1HP kit that I think will work perfectly; electric motor power ratings can't really be directly compared to ICE engine HP because they've got instant torque whereas the ICE engine has a torque curve to where the power isn't really available until higher in the RPM range. All of the kits I'm looking at have the ability to be run in reverse I'm just making sure that the speed can be controlled while in reverse for backlapping. Right now it looks like the conversion stuff will run less than $200 excluding bolts, adapter plates I'll have to fabricate, and sprockets unless I decide to go for a higher power unit.


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## mowww (Jan 16, 2018)

@quadmasta any luck with the conversion?


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Life got in the way so I haven't made any progress on this


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## pschattle15 (Apr 3, 2020)

@quadmasta did the safety yellow and safety red match the existing colors on the McLane pretty well? I'm cleaning rust off of mine currently and will be priming it before too long. Just curious on color match of spray paint. thanks.


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

pschattle15 said:


> @quadmasta did the safety yellow and safety red match the existing colors on the McLane pretty well? I'm cleaning rust off of mine currently and will be priming it before too long. Just curious on color match of spray paint. thanks.


I gave up on the McLane branded one after I got more stuff apart. I don't have access to a lathe, welder, or metal brake and some of the stuff was destroyed by rust.

However, I've found a really good source of battery cells I can use to make an extremely powerful rechargeable battery so I'll probably convert it to electric during next offseason


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

I finally got some parts I was waiting on.

[media]https://youtu.be/gDqJ0X0wTZk[/media]

I've got some time off from work coming up so I'll be able to work more on this.


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## SGrabs33 (Feb 13, 2017)

quadmasta said:


> I finally got some parts I was waiting on.
> 
> [media]https://youtu.be/gDqJ0X0wTZk[/media]
> 
> I've got some time off from work coming up so I'll be able to work more on this.


Cool stuff for sure. Man that sprocket was spinning fast! Keep this updated.


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Thanks! That was the only sprocket I could find that's the right chain pitch and I have no idea if it'll work without having to use a jackshaft. I need to mark it up and get the optical tachometer to see what sorts of speeds it's doing and compare it to what I measured with the gas engine.


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## a_chan (May 4, 2020)

quadmasta said:


> I finally got some parts I was waiting on.
> 
> [media]https://youtu.be/gDqJ0X0wTZk[/media]
> 
> I've got some time off from work coming up so I'll be able to work more on this.


Definitely cool seeing the progress so far. Battery reels are far and few but if this works out, we might have more options with all these used Mclanes floating around :lol:


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## MustangO4 (Sep 14, 2020)

Well, I'm following your lead with these two beasts. I just ordered the same setup. I think it won't be hard to make a dead man switch off the twist throttle. It will take about 2 weeks to get here. Then we'll see how running Ryobi 18v batteries in series and parallel works out! (BTW, I'm Everyday Drone Guy on YT). - John, in the real world


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## MustangO4 (Sep 14, 2020)

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/32904975964.html This is the one I got


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## kichigai (Jun 23, 2019)

@quad... what kind of paint stripper are you using? I'm in the process of restoring a McLane but aircraft paint stripper isn't cutting it. the original powder coating is so hard to remove


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

kichigai said:


> @quad... what kind of paint stripper are you using? I'm in the process of restoring a McLane but aircraft paint stripper isn't cutting it. the original powder coating is so hard to remove


If it's powdercoat you're kinda screwed. You have to use serious stripper to do that. Find a local powdercoating shop and get a quote from them on doing it; it'll probably save you time.



MustangO4 said:


> Well, I'm following your lead with these two beasts. I just ordered the same setup. I think it won't be hard to make a dead man switch off the twist throttle. It will take about 2 weeks to get here. Then we'll see how running Ryobi 18v batteries in series and parallel works out! (BTW, I'm Everyday Drone Guy on YT). - John, in the real world


I'm going to ditch the twist throttle completely. It's a really low-quality piece and there's really bad "notchiness" In the throttle where the readings going to the controller spike and cause the motor to stall. I measured the voltage output by the throttle but I haven't had time to find a control that would work and be robust/easy to use yet.


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## MustangO4 (Sep 14, 2020)

Well, my motor arrives tomorrow and was just wondering if you have made any progress. Thanks and mow well!


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## MustangO4 (Sep 14, 2020)

Getting there!

https://youtu.be/cXhtLnyfsG0


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Got lazy and was putting the project off again but my Deadman exploded today.







Chain is too short so I ordered a longer one and a breaker. Also ordered a nutsert tool to help make threaded holes in thin material.

Everything is rigged with zip ties until I find out what works and what doesn't.


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Rivnut gun came today so I got everything a semi- permanent home. Still waiting on the chain. I might also end up making a different throttle instead of the thumb throttle but we'll see


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

Chain came today and I got to test it out.








Ignore the sad state of the back yard. I'm waiting for a contractor to do the patio before I renovate.


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## ShadowGuy (Nov 20, 2020)

@quadmasta Looks good! How long does the charge last?


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

ShadowGuy said:


> @quadmasta Looks good! How long does the charge last?


I've got about 2000sqft and I mowed that with no problem on that 2Ah battery plus all of the testing I've done over the past few days messing around with it. It's only running at maybe 10% "throttle" so I assume the battery would last a really long time. I don't want to push it as there's no cutoff protection any more since I'm directly pulling power from the battery and bypassing communication with its BMS.


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## ShadowGuy (Nov 20, 2020)

quadmasta said:


> ShadowGuy said:
> 
> 
> > @quadmasta Looks good! How long does the charge last?
> ...


That is excellent. I am tempted to pick up another McLane and repower it with electric. That way I can get in some early morning mows.


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

It was pretty easy. I was able to reuse 2 bolt holes for the deadman and the hole for the chain guard on the jackshaft to hold my adapter plate in place. Two of the mounting holes for the motor lined up directly with the main support rib under the deck. I probably should've just drilled more mounting holes in the motor but I ended up using nutserts in my aluminum plate and grinding a bit of the mower deck away. The other two are through holes with bolts/nuts. Due to the larger chain and larger diameter sprocket on the motor, I had to also cut away some of the hole where the chain passes through the deck.

Mine's a 3kW motor but you could probably do with far less.


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## raymond (May 4, 2018)

Love this - nice work. Excited to see progress


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## cokenner (Apr 27, 2021)

What bearings did you purchase for the side panels? Mine are shot and I'm at a loss, can't even get them removed..


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## quadmasta (Apr 3, 2019)

cokenner said:


> What bearings did you purchase for the side panels? Mine are shot and I'm at a loss, can't even get them removed..


I ended up finding a second mower in better shape and used that to convert so I didn't replace the bearings.


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