When you buy a riding lawn mower, you are making an investment. You certainly want a durable piece of equipment that is long lasting and can handle the wear and tear of frequent use. Honda offers some of the finest top of the line mowers made with high-quality parts. As with most equipment, maintenance is essential in keeping your mower running in top condition. Find out how to properly care for your Honda H1011 Riding Mower.

Safety Precautions

Before you begin any maintenance or service on your Honda mower, it is important to know that you should take some basic safety precautions first.

• Carbon monoxide poisoning – whenever operating the engine be sure to have proper ventilation.
• Engine and exhaust system burns- after running the motor for a period of time, it can become extremely hot. Be sure to let it cool down before touching.
• Moving parts- can cause serious injuries. The engine should be off and all parts should be inactive before performing any work on the machine.

Maintenance Schedule

The maintenance schedule can be split into two different types: routine and interval maintenance. Routine maintenance refers to each time you start your Honda mower and interval maintenance refers to maintenance over longer periods of time. The maintenance schedule applies to the normal operational use of the mower.

You should get into the habit each time you start your Honda mower to check the fuel level, oil level, air cleaner, cooling air intake, muffler pipe, cooling fan screen, battery electrolyte, tires and air pressure, blade belt, brake pedal, and the blade condition. While this may sound like a lot of work, it only requires a quick once-over to make sure nothing requires any attention.

Approximately every 3 months you should perform an oil change. This is one of the most important components of engine life and performance. Here are some tips in changing the oil of the Honda H1011 Riding Mower:

• Use 4-stroke automotive detergent oil only
• The recommended viscosity is SAE l0W-30. This combination provides an oil that flows easily at low temperatures but still protects the engine at high temperatures.

To change the oil, you must first drain the old oil while the engine is still warm. Remove the rear cover, and clean around the oil cap. Take the tubing from the bottom of the oil filler tube and attach it to the drain fitting and place the opposite end of the tubing into a 2-quart container that is appropriate for draining oil. Using a 10mm wrench, open the oil drain petcock (also located at the bottom of the oil filler tube) to begin draining. After the oil has completely drained, close the petcock valve and proceed to fill the recommended amount of oil through the filler tube.

Another important component to engine life and performance is the air cleaner. Once it gets dirty it can cause major wear and tear on the engine, this is why it is important to clean often and replace if need be.

Other Service Tasks

As you can see there are many simple maintenance procedures that you can easily do yourself. Further instruction is provided in your Honda H1011 Riding Mower owner’s manual. However, if you are having other problems with your mower, you should probably take it in for service to a skilled professional. To ensure the best quality and reliability, use only new, genuine Honda parts.

If you need new parts for your Honda H1011 Riding Mower, check out hondalawnparts.com. They sell high-quality OEM parts and ship anywhere in the U.S. and Canada. Easily identify the parts you need with their exceptional online descriptions and parts diagrams.