How to Fix A Stuck Pull Cord on Your Lawn Mower

Are you wrestling with a stuck pull cord on your lawn mower? Is it suddenly difficult to pull the start rope on your lawn mower, in order to start it up? The following post will reveal possible causes and their remedies to solve this commonly encountered problem. The good news is, rarely, is it a sign of catastrophic engine failure, but rather, other more simple fixes, that we will reveal here, are all that is necessary to get you back to mowing in a pinch. No special tools are required. Continue reading to learn how to fix a stuck lawn mower pull cord now!

How a Pull Cord Works to Start Your Engine

When you start your lawn mower, you first remove the brake on the flywheel by pressing down the blade brake bail. Doing so will allow the flywheel to spin freely. With the flywheel free to spin, when the starter rope is pulled it spins the flywheel, through the mechanical interaction of the recoil assembly pawls and the flywheel nut. The flywheel has magnets built into it that when they pass by the ignition coil, at a great velocity, create a spark to fire your engine. This brief explanation will make more sense as we explore the solutions to fixing a stuck pull cord on your lawn mower next.

Blade Brake Bail Not Engaged

In order to start a lawn mower, a safety bar, also known as a blade brake bail or operator engagement bail, needs to be depressed in order to allow the recoil (the housing where the pull rope is wound) to spin freely. No matter how hard you pull, the pull rope will not free itself up, without causing damage to the recoil, if the blade brake bail is not first depressed! Like all modern lawn mowers, always press and hold the blade brake bail down first, then pull the start rope, in this order. More information on how to start a lawn mower can be found in one of our previous posts here: Learn these Simple Steps to Start Most ANY Small Engine Confidently!

Always press this bar down first, then, while holding it down, simultaneously reach down to pull starter rope

Damage to Blade Brake Cable

If you make sure to depress the blade brake bail as shown above and the pull rope remains difficult to pull, if at all, the problem may be damage to the blade brake cable itself. The green arrows below point to the metal wire cables that are housed within the rubber cable portion, as labeled below. Rust and corrosion can cause these cables to seize and possibly tear and not engage the kill switch plate where a flywheel brake may be located on your machine. If the brake is not released off the flywheel, it essentially holds the flywheel in place preventing it to be spun by the pull rope. Follow the cable down to the brake on your flywheel and see if when you press down on the bar that the brake is effectively released from the flywheel. If nothing is moving, look to replace the cable.

Recoil Components Damaged

A tell tale sign that there is potentially damage to the recoil housing components, such as the flywheel cup, recoil pawls, etc. is that after pulling the start rope, the rope fails to retract, and essentially rewind itself. It may now instead of being difficult to pull, has now become loosened, with a lot of slack. Such a condition warrants the recoil assembly to be removed and inspected.

Recoil assembly is located within the engine cover, remove the engine cover to gain access

Engine cover removed

Underside of engine cover revealing recoil assembly

When pulling starter rope pawls expand to engage flywheel nut

Inspect to see that both pawls are present and moving freely and that nothing appears broken, loose or missing.

The flywheel nut is what the expanded pawls engage with and allow the pull rope to spin the flywheel to start the engine

Ignition Coil Not Properly Gapped

If the ignition coil is not air gapped, it will rub against the flywheel and create friction making it either very difficult or impossible to pull the starter rope. The picture below shows a snapshot of the process to correctly set the air gap on your lawn mower's ignition coil. Please refer to our post Learn to Fix your Lawn Mower: Fix Majority of No-Start Lawn Mower Issues Pertaining to Spark, Yourself! to learn the process and do this yourself!

Hopefully by examining your lawn mower and implementing one of the above remedies, you are now able to pull the starter rope freely and get to mowing!

Never the Norm!

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