[Pelican]

I stumbled upon a real nice bargain, a 6 month's old Skag with a 21 horse Kawi. It only has 12 hours on it and is real clean! I'm a little concerned about an engine vibration though. I've owned Kohlers and Briggs V twins and this engine vibrates more than either of them. Is this a trait of Kawasaki? I've never owned one. The seller also had a 17 horse Kawi that I ran, same vibration frequency but not as noticeable.

[Bill Schwab]

Kashwacki's have head gasket problems. Vibration sounds like something else. Also, if it is under warrantee, no matter what the age, Kaw will deny your claim and creater a reason for the failure pointing blame at you.

[Pelican]

That's not too encouraging! I ordered a new machine with the Kawi because I had had so much trouble with my Kohlers. Kawis are no good?

[Nebraska]

Never had a problem with our Kawasaki engines... Only four of them though. One is a 15HP on an Exmark mower and is going on 7 years old. On all our small engines we perform monthly oil changes and every other month oil and filter changes. Oil levels checked daily.

[Bill Schwab]

Well, you are asking a guy who would love to see their factory burn to the ground, so let me share with some experiences I know of and had with Kaw. Though I have a serious axe to grind with Kawasaki, these incidents really happened, and, frankly, if the power of the internet was around then, they might have been stopped.

Here we go.....

2 month old engine looses it's bottom end. Kaw takes your engine, disassembles it on their time. In the mean time, my mower is either engineless, or, I buy a new engine, run with it and they determine weather or not they are going to repay you and honor their word. In my case, they told me I allowed dirt to enter the induction system and that caused the rod to break....The idiots did not know that our family owned a marina at the time, and my father had been teaching me small engines and the crux since I was 6 years old. Dirt entering into an engine through the carb will score the cylinder and cause compression to drop, it is extremely doubtfull a rod broke because of it.

Those of you who live in Penn state may or may not be familiar with RAR landscaping. Alan had purchased some 30 new mowers all with Kaws on them. Little by little, the mowers began grenading, one engine at a time after a month or two of service. After an examination by Kawasakis fiendish "Doctor No" ( some flunky they pay to fly around a justify rejected claims) he determined the cause for failures (30 some odd of them) was that RAR had used the wrong cleaning fluid in the pressure washer they cleaned the decks with. All claims on lost engines had been rejected, and 30 units, say $800.00 a piece for engines, do the math.

All engine manufacturers have had thier issues, but, at least Kohler and Briggs have always honored their word and repaired what was covered under warrantee at no charge to me.

[Mac]

Pelican,

Ive a 19 kaw, essentially the same engine. It just turned over 350 hours and has done its job well. I recently demoed a unit with a 23 koh and was very impressed with that engine. Im likely going to be switching the fleet over to Koh as they need replaced.

In a couple days, i can post a sheet listing the Kaw part numbers to get the canister air filter kit if yours doesnt have it yet.

[TCLL]

I have a bit of experience with kohlers, but not as much with kawasaki's. I have HEARD very bad things about kawi. they purr like a kitten (in theory) but are very sensative to contaminants in thefuel system. which would lead to scoring. my local dealer has done 6 reborings on kawi's under warranty in the last two years. they have done none on kohlers.

the kohler engines may run a bit rougher, but they are not as touchy as the kohlers.

[Pelican]

I've been running my new machines about a month now and am very happy with them. They've got more power than my Kohlers ever did. I've got hour meters on them both so we'll see how things go long term.

My Kohlers were VERY sensitive to dirt in the carb, I was doing teardowns almost monthly to keep them running smoothly. It didn't matter how often I changed filters, and I did it often! Again, time will tell how the Kawis fair.

[TCLL]

really? did you have the old "K" series kohler engines?

the old time kawi's were better than the kohlers, I think that the "new" kawi's are too refined and fine tuned for my tastes.

not that I would never own a kawi, their torque numbers are impressive, very impressive indeed.

but, if I had my choice, I would pick kohler. I would be afraid of being left stranded by kawi. I just hope I never send them an engine to be told "that it was my fault" and have nothing for my trouble.

[Pelican]

These were the 20 hp Command and 22 hp Magnum. They appeared identical and most parts interchanged. I had the same problems with both engines, carb problems, they'd suck the intake manifold gasket in, oil consumption..... One time it sucked in the gasket, probably for the third time and I didn't realize it, created a lean burn condition and burned the exhaust valve. By then it dropped that cylinder. I've had just too many problems with them, time for a change.....I hope for the better!