Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

A Lawn Boy mower made by Toro with a Kohler engine.... Three old and great names in landscaping, so has to be good. Unfortunately, I guess times have changed and everything now seems to be made as cheaply and cost effectively as possible. Unpacked the unit, added oil and gas, pulled the rope and it started up immediately!... Very nice. Took it out on the lawn and it wouldnt pull itself, required me to push it.. Not good. Read the owners manual and discovered there is an adjustment so did that and now it is self propelled as advertised.. So that indicates to me that the manufacturer has no quality control in place. The customer is the one who is now the Quality Control and you get to use your time to get it fixed.. Next thing-- I had been mowing for 15 or so minutes and shut it off to make a phone call. That took ten minutes and when I attempted to start the mower it just barely ran and blew lots of black smoke and finally died. Wouldnt start again, an indication that the automatic choke had restricted air flow. So after waiting for an hour tried starting it again and it started immediately.. Pretty inconvenient if one is in a hurry. It is consistent in this malfunction and I have finally found a way to bypass the automatic choke with a piece of wire to make it inoperative when the engine is hot. So that is poor design by Kohler. Another problem is that this is difficult to pull backwards with the drive disengaged. Dont know why, but its a real pain. So another poorly designed feature.. And last (at least so far) is the very common complaint that the front wheel height adjustment is crap. I mowed the lawn three or four times though before the plastic bumps that hold the adjustment lever in place wore out and let the front end of the mower drop to the ground. And as some people have said it is a fairly easy thing to fix if you dont need to keep adjusting the cutting height, by using either a bungee cord to hold things together or to take a screw and screw the plastic parts together. Not a good thing either way, but it will work. So another design flaw. I am not happy with this mower. The people who designed it should be ashamed of themselves, its not like the technology isnt out there, reliable mowers have been built for decades so IMHO there is no excuse for this . It seems to be designed to be made as cheaply as possible and make the most profit. I cannot buy another mower so I am stuck with it. However you can make a very safe bet that I will *never* purchase another Kohler, Lawn Boy, or Toro product. They just dont seem to care about quality anymore.