Hi! I am Kevin Gillis with TTI, and today we are talking about winterizing portable gas-powered tools. This unit right here ground-mount unit is our Lawn Mower. The first thing we need to do is decide whether we want to take all the gas out of the unit which means we have to run the unit and just let it die out, or if we want to add stabilizer to the gas. I recommend adding stabilizer.

So basically all you are going to do, is you are just going to unscrew your gas cap here, and for a gas tank of this size, usually adding an ounce to two and a half gallons, so that's what I am going to do. Just got loosened that up there, pop it open. So what you have to do with this type of stabilizer? You will just squeeze it and you will see that it fills up the chamber, and I am actually going to look at the front here. So once I get to an ounce, I am going to pour that in there. Okay, now once that's stabilizes in there, what I am want to do is I am going to want to actually run the unit for at least 15 minutes to get that stabilizer into the carburetor, and get it good and cleaned for the season. And make sure that it hits all the area that it needs to do. So the next thing we want to do, is we want to take our Lawn Mower outside and just flip it over and kind of get all that debris, all those grass clippings out there. We can just grab the hose and just hose it down, make sure that's all clean for the next season.

Next you are going to want to take off your blade. And what you are going to need for that is your socket and a glove, because you don't want to get a steady firm grip on the blade itself, and the blade can be sharp. So you grab your socket, just loosen up that bolt, kind of give it a hand, hand loosen it, and then pull it right off. You are always going to want to refer to your owner's manual, because that will let you know the size of the socket and what you should be using to take your blade off. Okay.

Once you get the blade off, we are going to examine it to see how sharp it is. Now this one actually is pretty sharp, but if it would be dull, there is two things you can do; you can sharpen it yourself with an angle grinder. Now you have remember that these are balanced correctly by the factory, so you are going to want to balance this blade. So you can go out, and get a machine and pay a lot of money or you can do an easy trick, just take a nail, put it on the wall, hang it on there, and watch your balance. Okay, if you don't feel comfortable doing that then you can do to your home improvement warehouse, and pick up a new blade which is what I would recommend.

What we are going to do now? We are going to take a look at the lawn mower and see if I can identify any rust parts. If there is any rust, we want to get to it immediately, because we don't want that sitting over the winter months. So as I am looking around here, I could actually see I get some rust down here. So what I am going to do, is I am actually going to pick up my wire brush and, what I can do is I can scrub down all on it. We have also got some here on this, anything that has exposed metal, you are going to see that it is going to rust out. So that's really what you are looking for, and see some right here. So I can just scrub that down there, and get that cleaned up and I think that's it. So from here we are going to want to go into checking the air filter.

Now the air filter is actually depending on the Lawn Mower. This one is located right here. Some of them have knobs, that you have to loosen or even maybe fill set. So you definitely want to refer to your owners manual again. But this one right here is just a pop up, so all I have to do is just pop it off just like that and I can take a look at it. Now this is again one of those foam filters, so I am able to wash this in warm water and soap, and then put it back in here. Now this one is looking a little dirty, so that's something that I do want to, that I would want to do soon in order to keep it clean. But if you have a paper filter and it is dirty, you can probably bang it out, but if it is too dirty, you just want to toss it and get a new one. You want to do that again before next season, because you don't want any dust or debris to enter in there.

So we will put that back on. Now what we are going to do? We are going to check out the spark plug as well as check the oil. So let's do that. First thing, I am going have to do is grab my socket here to change it. Okay, now this is where my spark plug is located, but depending on your user manual it may be located at different location. Here I want to get the right size of socket, we are just going to roll that in there, and just give it up, there I go. I will loosen it up here, and here we go, alright? Down here little dirty, but it works. Okay, if didn't, obviously if it will look spoiled, if it look like there were something wrong with it, we would want to replace it. Now we wouldn't want to leave it out again dust and debris collecting in this area over here. So now I seen that, it looks okay, I am just going to put it back in there. That is our spark plug.

Now let's check our oil. Now depending on your unit, it depends on you how you check the oil? Some units you have to actually screw it all the way in, unscrew and pop it out; other units, you just leave it unscrewed and pop it out. With this unit right here, all we have to do is leave it unscrewed. We are going to pull it out, we are going to wipe down our dip stick here and we are going to pop it back in, and we are we are going to look at the line. Yeah, definitely this is going to need some oil. So what I am going to do, is I am going to grab my funnel right here. I am going to pop that in there. I am going to grab my engine oil here, I am just going to pour some in. Here we go, it is just to lubricate it, put this back on. Okay, tighten that down and you are done. You have fully winterized your Lawn Mower. Next we are going to be winterizing our Pressure Washer.