LA145 will not start

ArdenK · Oct 20, 2015

Hi All,
This is a weird situation. I pulled the LA145 out of shed and drove it to my garage, 50 ft., then shut it down. I filled the gas tank then tried to start it, all it did was crank. I let it sit for a bit because I thought it might be flooded, apparently not, got same results 30 minutes later. The next day, same thing, I tried starter spray too. Not even a bark.

I checked voltage at;
When cranking I知 getting 12 volts at solenoid to starter and 1.2 volts at the coil.

Fuel and air seem ok, I知 thinking something is wrong with the spark but I知 not sure

Your help is greatly appreciated.

Thank you very much for your assistance.
Arden

Dave M7040 · Oct 20, 2015

Spend some time on this Briggs and Stratton web site.
Why wont my engine start
Dave M7040

beenthere · Oct 20, 2015

I would stay far far away from starter spray... just sayin. Put a bit of fuel in the sparkplug hole after verifying you have good spark. You are safer doing it that way.

You need spark, fuel, and air. Track them down to find out which are missing.

Richard001 · Oct 20, 2015

beenthere said:
I would stay far far away from starter spray... just sayin. Put a bit of fuel in the sparkplug hole after verifying you have good spark. You are safer doing it that way.

You need spark, fuel, and air. Track them down to find out which are missing.

While I think you meant compression, you said air. But you are correct, you need those three things for a engine to run. Now you can have compression, fuel and spark, but it still won't run if the spark is at the wrong time.

If the tractor has been sitting for some time with fuel in the carb, that is where I would start looking for problems.

ArdenK · Oct 21, 2015

Thank you for your replies.
I'm pretty sure I'm not getting a spark, does anyone know what the running voltage is for the ignition coils? I'm getting 1.2v while cranking.

It's really odd because it was running, I shut it down to add gas then no start.

Thank you for your assistance.

Richard001 · Oct 22, 2015

Arden,
I am not familiar with your tractor, but most likely it has a motor not made by JD. Can you find a identification plate on the engine and post that info here. The reason I ask is that, as you most likely know by now, that JD does not make there manuals available online. But they don't have control over what the engine mfg does. So most engine manufactures post there engine specs online.

Without knowing what type of ignition your engine has, I can not answer your questions about voltages seen at the coil.

A easy and quick way to check for spark is to remove the plug(s), clip a ground wire to them and crank the engine. Look for bright blue spark on the plugs. Be sure to ground the plugs as most modern spark control boxes don't like the unused voltage that is created if the plug is not grounded to dissipate the spark.