"Got Tired of Screwing With It . . ."

Yup. I got tired of screwing around with the old weedeater and went got a new one. Oh, I will work on the old one, it is too good to give up on. But work had to be done.

I am more careful with this new one. It is a Troybuilt, a brand now owned by MTD, same folks as the Cub Cadet but a couple of steps down the ladder so to speak.

So all the tool heads attach, like the blower, the edger and the cultivator. And of course several versions of weedeater heads. So I have lots of weedeater stuff.

I am taking my time breaking it in. This one simply says use 40:1 oil mix where as in the past it said 40:1 but run a tank full of fuel that is mixed at a lower ratio for break in. I looked through the cheap but bountiful instruction sheet and saw no such break in directions.

It is a 25 CC engine, the same size we use on model airplanes in gasoline applications. So I doctored the fuel with a 2.6 ounce bottle of special blend 2 cycle oil and added about an ounce and half of Castor oil. I have plenty of Castor oil from my Radio Control applications.

Castor oil is unique in that it will blend with alcohol or gasoline while basic automotive grade oils will not mix with alcohol. So it blends in well and is a super additive for break in. It is a higher temperature oil and when it gets hot, it morfs into an even larger molecule. So it is excellent for break ins. It forms a varnish type coating and is good for bearings. Plus it smells good or at least in my mind smells better than the normal exhaust for a 2 cycle gasoline engine.

I am giving it heat cycles. Run for a while, let it cool down and then do it again. We call this temp cycles in the model business. After five or six cycles it will be essentially broken in. So I am treating it gently and feeding it good stuff. I hope it lasts.

Now I gotta go edge some more. . .