John Deere's Revenge

I bought the John Deere LX280 in Sept. 2005. It's been a great lawn mower and snow plow.

Last summer (2013) I was having pain in my left thigh and I went to see Dr. Mark Haring. He recommended that I not be riding the lawn mower. So I left it sit in the shed all summer and used the push mower. My leg did get better, I lost some weight and got in a little better shape. However in the fall, when I got the John Deere out to start collecting leaves, I discovered that a mouse had built a nest in the engine.

The JD engine with the cowl removed. Mouse Mess. There is some pink near the magneto on the left side. That is what is left of the mouse.

They used to do this in the TroyBuilt mower I had before the John Deere. It took a couple of hours to clean up and I know from experience that the mice will keep coming back (even though the one that built this next was made into mouseburger.) My guess is that they smell the urine form the previous occupant and that attracts them.

So I determined to not let them keep infesting my mower.

So I found on the Internet a rather ingenious design for a trap. It uses a 1 liter plastic soda bottle over the top of a 5 gallon bucket. The bucket has about an inch of anit-freeze in the bottom (enough to kill a mouse and not freeze over winter).

The bottle is smeared with peanut butter around the center. When the mouse attempts to to get the peanut butter, the bottle roles and the mouse drops into the bucket.

From last fall until today (April 12, 2014) I terminated four mice with this device. It will continue to sit next to the John Deere wherever it is parked!

Looking into the top of the mousetrap. You can see the bottle with the peanut butter and the victims in the bottom.

January 2022, Tie Rod Repair

This is the third time I've made this repair. The previous two times, I soldered the washer onto the tie rod end. This time I'm welding it. The previous two times lasted for several years each time. That's not bad, but this time the thing came apart while I was plowing snow a quarter mile down the driveway. The previous failures were in the yard in the summer time. Not a big deal. But when I have to walk all the way back home, to get the wire to effect the temporary repair so that I can get it back home... Well enough is enough. Time to do it right.

Got it welded. It's hard to imagine that this will come apart. I also drilled a hole in the back of the other end of the tie rod so that I can use my chain saw grease gun to grease the tie rod ball. I'd done that to this one the last time it was apart. It works good.