The adventures of a new ope service writer

I promised to keep this going. Heres an update.

Im officially at a year in and still happy here. Our stupid crazy busy season is in week one. Im light years more prepared this year and excited for it.

This weeks common theme is mid 70's year old customers checking out new ztr vs their lawn tractor asking if it mows in reverse lol. Gotta love homeowners.

After telling them yes, and letting them test drive one, they sell themselves.

Next week will be the first week of all the broken commercial equipment. Stay tuned for lots of funnies

 

126 chains in the wash bucket exactly 2 of them had the depth gauges touched, 2 were trashed. that was a marathon of grinding.
Good luck with the commercial " I need it yesterday" crowd.

 

What are you using for a grinder? How long, on average, does it take you per chain?

 

I drove by the local mower shop this morning. It was s-s-slammed with old guys who decided today was the day to fire up 'ol betty and mow the yard....until it wasn't the day.

 

You got that right.

 

Have eight grinders all basically the same Tecomec/ Oregon ( 2 of those were AX Oregon units - wore the vise out about once per quarter. A 310 silvy and an old Foley. Can't really give a time stamp- as I clean all of them in the blast cabinet first then rinse in Mineral sprits, then start grinding. grinders are set up in sets of 3 - front /back/depth so I am not resetting the vise left and right. Use a caliper to match cutters length wise as I have yet to find a grinder that cuts both the same length.

 

After what seems like 2 weeks of rain, the commercial guys are finally at it cutting grass. Today yielded 1 swimmer ( mower that got ridden into the pond) and countless machines that failed to get a pre season once over.

Give the new guys another week to beat on these machines and things will be downright comical.

 

I also had another five hour old efi kohler go down to one hole. I see a trend here. Hopefully it's just a bad ignition module.

 

Barley powered autosteer?

 

What do you know about Ferris IS2600Z (Z turn) with Yanmar diesel? Possibly looking at a new one for my employer...the dealer is trying to steer us to a gas model, we'd rather go diesel...

 

No. Just a new guy with rwd on a 30 degree slope. Operator error. Lol.

 

I would need to research this. No info off the top of my head. Yanmar doesn't make junk as you know but that has nothing to do with cut quality.

Fwiw around here Ferris has little to no reputation for cut quality. Comfortable......different story.

 

I've heard that...something to do with the suspension I guess...not a huge deal though, its a commercial property so...meh...

Right...not sure what the dealers issue is with them...they are pushing stuff with 35 (ish) HP gas V-twins...sounds thirsty to me...and we have no gasoline on premises...only diesel. And when we went from gas to diesel on the Ventrac mower back in 2008 the fuel usage was cut over 50%...

 

My Husqvarna has a switch for mowing in reverse on or off.
What's nuts is with an electric engage for the mowing deck they could easily disengage the deck, but no, they shut off the mower engine . WTF.

 

Another swimmer yesterday....This one ended up upside down with no injuries. Wet grass and steep slopes don't mix well with zero turns.

 

Somebody was lucky and blessed then.

 

A couple of todays tidbits. 12 inch grass vs 8 inch tall broken off basketball goal.


5 hour old $15,000 exmark. Top 10 nations nation's largest landscaper as a customer. Deck fell off.



And then on my lunchbreak I was cutting a few yards and this happened to my walk behind. Yep....im one of those guys who failed to check much other than oil