I Need a Low Fuel Alarm for My Wifes Riding Lawn Mower

Or perhaps take a chance on a new wife?

That would defeat the purpose of having her do the mowing while tcmtech sips an iced tea on the front porch.

There is a solution for his wife, THINK ABOUT WHAT YOU'RE DOING. CHECK THE OIL, CHECK THE GAS LEVEL AS THE YOU'RE MOWING. Although if she has run out 40 times and she still hasn't learned maybe he should start paying little "Johnny" from down the street to do the mowing.

You have a wife that will MOW your grass, and your complaining.

What type of tank is on this? I've seen caps that have a fuel indicator in them. But that was many years ago on a push mower. Works with a floating cork, which has a thin sheet steel helix blade that drives the pointer visible on the cap. Is the tank sheet steel or plastic? I would think you could get a simple pressure switch that you install into the side of the tank. But I've never looked for one that has seals that are gasoline proof.

TCMTECH, I did a search for "after market fuel gauge". I added in lawn tractor mower low fuel.

The alarm requirement is going to be tough without home grown. Pressure transducer in fuel line, and some sort of OP-AMP circuit, with analog comparator is probably not what you want, but that may be the only way to get you to a audio alarm. I'm just trying to throw dumb ideas out so one of these, triggers the "eureka" solution, in one of these "helpful" engrs here.

eBay, has minions of gas cap fuel level indicators, but none for aftermarket gas engine use with a electrical sending unit, that I could find.

If you can use this type of cap, I have seen pressure gauges modified with an alarm by affixing a wire to the dial and another through the face. When fuel level falls it will set off the alarm.

Those type of fuel level caps tend to bounce around when jostled so it would probably beep a bit until the level dropped enough for continuous alarm.

_{Oh...and could you talk to my missus and get her to cut my lawn too?}

Drew K

Even better. When fuel gets low enough the ark at the pointer will ignite the fumes and she will notice. Unfortunately it will require replacement of mower as well as wife.

Most people would top-up the tank before starting it, while it is at ambient temperature for safety considerations. It seems there is a training opportunity there somewhere...

When gas is not there every single time and wife mows is pain and fuel the problem afterwards lawn mower sit and simple sensor solve the problem.

You need power to have it turn on a 120 dB piezo alarm

solved....

You must have a huge lawn or a small mower! I can run my 22hp tractor for 3 hrs on a tank of gas! I agree on fill up first, but it would be a neat device to set off that alarm...you could also rig a shock device to the seat!

Dr. bigg is putting on his psychologist's hat. Bearing in mind I have never met your wife, much less interviewed her (appointments only $100/hr since I'm not licensed) . . . DO NOT install a low fuel alarm. This would be extremely antagonistic. There is more going on here than simple oversight. Your wife feels subconsciously that she is not getting recognition from you that she is doing a task that is rightfully yours (even if she may enjoy it) and/or you should be more involved in the outside maintenance of your home. Running out of gas is a way to get you up and off the couch and forcing you to recognize, even if in a negative way, what she has done and getting you involved in a small way. Installing an alarm would be like saying not only do you not recognize her efforts, but that you don't wish to be reminded that you don't appreciate her. Now, don't you feel ashamed for having this hare-brained idea?

P.S. Why don't you just fill the mower sometime between mowings? (And check the oil). Surely you don't have her mowing a lawn that takes more than one tank of gas!

Convert to propane....

http://www.propanecarbs.com/lawnmowers.html

That container looks more like a beer keg - I do hope thats for refuelling the driver

Easier to prime but still a hassle carrying propane tank out to mower.

Okay to be more clear.

My wife has "Goldfish memory" (Once around the yard and its a whole new yard in her mind apparently) when it comes to this sort of obvious stuff and the lawn mower has a 3 gallon tank with a very obvious fuel level sight line right on the side of the tank which is very obvious to see provided you lean to the left a bit and look down and yes we have a big yard.

Typically when its done being used it's parked by the shop right next to the 3 - 4 five gallon fuel cans which I usually keep at least one full at all times.

Obviously visual reminders don't work here.

What is next is auditory reminders followed by a modified cattle prod shocker mounted in the seat but I need a way to trigger them of course!

I thought about the propane conversion being I have the parts but then again I have to fill the tank every time it runs out so there is no gain for me there either.

BTW I am writing "<--- CHECK/FILL THE GAS." on the dash of the mower in bright red paint pen today when I go out and re prime the fuel system and get it out of the ditch so I will see if that works. Still its visual so the odds are it won't work that well.

BTW we had this conversation last night and she actually asked for a alarm to remind her.

I asked her, How many times have you ran out of gas when you go and mow?

She said, Almost every time.

Then I said, Then why is it so hard to remember to check the gas before you mow?

From there things just sort of spiralled out of reality so in the end the mower needs a alarm now.

As for the alarm - is it really not possible to mount a second spark plug on the seat?

TCM,

Your wife has you trained very well and I applaud you for tending to your wonderful wife's behaviours.

This really isn't about her 'remembering' to check/fill the fuel (does she routinely run the car out of fuel?).She simply does what she enjoys (mowing) and leaves the unpleasant things for you.

If that fulfills your existance then bravo! (Though I would be inclined to service the mower in between mowing outings rather than torture myself with the burden of retrieving-refilling-repriming etc. (unless I thrived on 'martyrdom' )).

If not,maybe it's time to leave the mower where your wife leaves it.

I'm actually more concerned with her running the mower wearing flip-flops.Or was it sandels?

Sorry,but a 'practical' solution does not exist for this situation.

All the best

Jay (coming out of anon mode)

Since there is probably an interlock under the seat which allows starting etc. How about connecting an alarm/automated voice reminder to that. She sits on the mower, the alarm goes off or "tells her to check the gas", she turns the alarm off (it would need a reset timer I think), she fills it, and mows...I know, I know, she'll just shut it off, complain about the noise, start mowing and still run out...which may still happen even if you have an alarm connected to the fuel gauge!

Not only that, what makes you think she won't just park it and walk away when the alarm goes off?

I wrote the "CHECK/FILL GAS & OIL" on the dash in big white letters where no one can miss it.

I was going to use red but then again she might have used color blindness as an excuse for not reading it. (Believe me she would.)

As far as getting a new mower are you kidding? It took weeks to get her to drive this one and it has a hydrostatic transmission. I am into this training for three summer now and I have yet to get her to stop wearing flip flop sandals when she mows. I quit with that argument and figure that until she lops of a few toes at some point she can do it however she wants.

(And no the toes will never be found or reattached and I will call her stumpy from then on!)

I was looking through eBay and saw small fuel primer squeeze bulbs for snowmobiles. I am thinking I will spend the $8 - $10 and get one next time I am in town. At least then getting it re primed and restarted will be easy.

Also thinking of making a rule that whomever runs the mower out of gas while the gas cans still have fuel has to drive to town and fill all of them at their own expense! By god if she has to put forth an effort and spend her own money she sure doesn't have trouble remembering things!

Over all the running out of gas itself is not such a big deal it's just the doing it once or twice a week every week all summer for three summers is what is getting old real fast. I have nieces that are 10 and 7 years old who are better about these sorts of things.

A wise choice.

I think this problem is serious one. Have a reserve switch and ask her to use reserve only to move out to safer location. Bikes have this. Good luck.

Baaaaaaaaaad boy!

We had sheep on the farm many years ago. Worthless damn things and far too much effort to keep in a fence.

I will stick with using a whiney wife who can't remember anything from one day to the next.

We had sheep...always looking for someplace to get killed/hurt! Intelligence someplace between a chicken and a rock!

"Honest, officer, I was just helping the sheep over the fence"

Actually she likes mowing the yard and I don't have to tell her to do it. She goes free will on that one. In fact she wanted to learn how in the beginning.

As far as the princes thing I made it clear before she ever moved here that I am more of a Shrek than a prince anything and I don't go for the spoiled princess type.

That said she does have the issue of only wanting to learn what she want to learn about something. It's sort of like having someone decide they want to learn to drive but will not learn to do left hand turns because they are harder than right hand turns.

Yea it makes no sense to me but thats how she works.

Add a small auxiliary tank beside or above the normal one with a turn off valve- this can be constantly kept full and just turn the lever when the normal tank runs out

And, when that tank runs dry????????????????????????????????

We're dealing with Mensa rejects here.

LOL...ok that just made my night...

Get a new wife

Nah - too expensive ! I'm at wife number three - with TWO 'girls' chasing me !

My neighbor used to mow an acre of lawn with a push mower by mowing a little every day. It was his exercise program and he had the tidiest lawn on the block.

My mower holds just enough gas to do the yard it I don't let the grass get too tall. I also quit watering and let the lawn go au natural and now I don't have to mow past midsummer. I also no longer have a $200 water bill in the fall.

After my neighbor's wife stuck her foot in the power mower they got rid of it and used a push mower from that point on.

What about re-filling it before she starts (or just after she finishes each time) so she has a full tank to start with?

Use a "liquid level gauge for fuel", McMaster #3610K41 for example. Mirror the needle in the gauge and mount a light source/photocell (or comparable laser device) about the needle where you want the alarm to sound. Liquid level goes down, mirror reflects light into photocell, alarm sounds, (wife has ear protectors on so she can't hear the alarm) persons are notified of low fuel level.

Hopefully this is a simple device to make and maintain. I haven' made one so I can not relate any history to you. Just remember- "KISS" Keep It Simple Stupid. Make sure you wire it into the ignition key or it might go off at 2am if there is any vaporization or leaks.

Good Luck, Old Salt

I have an obsolete beer keg. Make a good gas tank.

Most low fuel indicators are thermister based. Uses self-heating.

https://www.spiyda.com/magento/index.php/low-fuel-warning-light-module-thermistor-sender-61.html

Sounds like my wife she likes to now but refuses to mess with the gas can. Says its too heavy and smells funny. So a alarm is going to work just like the low gas alarm in her car doesn't affect her. .

Wrong?

As soon as the mowing starts, go out for a few hours.

Boy you can tell we all like to work on projects that take a lot of thought!

I asked my wife about this. She didn't see any problem with what your wife is doing! She said, "Obviously, mowing is her job, gas is his!" She hates to put gas in her car and waits for me to drive it so I have to fill it if possible. If, on the rare occasion she gets behind the self propelled mower, she asks me to check the gas for her, AND I usually have to start it the first time.

She is NOT mechanical at all...she's the one that once pushed the self propelled mower for an hour and complained how hard it was...was amazed when I showed her she forgot to engage the power and just walk behind it!

This is 120v but they may have a 12v version available

I didn't read all of the other replies or suggestions, but I did catch the shocker seat and I do feel your pain. If it "don't do right" then it automatically shows up on the honey-do list. Here's some info for you though.

Finding a piezo alarm shouldn't be difficult. Get a simple low fuel sensor thermistor for a motorcycle. May need an op-amp to give the alarm maximum "operator attention getting" potential. I would retrofit a petcock from an ATV or motorcycle with "reserve" on it, just as a failsafe to keep from running from the West 40 to East Bumble in the event it does run out. Good luck! Oh, and I like the shocker seat idea too, though that probably would fast track you to the doghouse.

These links may help with the alarm and thermistor, and can be adapted for your application:

Piezo alarm datasheet: http://challengeelectronics.com/downloads/piezo_alarms/continuous_alarms/CE-CU628BS.pdf

GE thermistor datasheet: http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/172544.pdf

Thermistor above available here: http://www.newark.com/ge-measurement-control-ge-sensing/rl2004-582-97-d1/ntc-thermistor/dp/20F735?Ntt=20F735

Instructions here: http://www.st-riders.net/index.php?topic=976.msg6775#msg6775

Hey! At least she mows the lawn. My wife couldn't even start our mower. Her parents had no sons, so as the oldest daughter, she had to mow the lawn when she was growing up and wants absolutely nothing to do with mowing ever again. (her Dad was a perfectionist so she had to re-mow many areas) I've tried to show her how to run the mower and she walks away and won't listen.

Take the key out of the ignition until the gas tank is full.

A manual float gauge with limit switch that activates a shock collar should do it.

If you have a sight glass in the line just put a 12 v eye with built in time delay looking at that then run the alarm. both are easly installed but pizzo alarms may not be that loud

Priceless.

OK looks like this thread has gone full circle...outta here.

Classical gas Mowtown... nice!

tcmtech, if you install a simple gas tank cap with the floating cork that would work, MAYBE. If she's too lazy to lift the lawn tractor's hood to check the fuel level from time-to-time, or even fill the gas tank before cutting the lawn, then you're sunk pal. Really sunk. She has you well trained or is getting even for some reason....busting your chops perhaps?

Have you thought of RETRAINING her? There must be classes for this sort of thing...somewhere.

You'd have better luck by obtaining a trained chimp to mow the lawn, or cutting the grass yourself. I went through the very same things with the Mrs. a half dozen years ago. Nothing worked. She also had an odd habit of running over garden hoses all too many times resulting in the freaking hoses being wound tight around the blades and bearings....she was too freaking lazy to wind them up after watering the bushes and flowers!!!!

Or you can get one of these puppies and have a ball of fun cutting the lawn yourself (if the time factor is an issue):

http://www.motorauthority.com/news/1085617_honda-uk-builds-100-mph-lawn-mower-video

If the truth hurts, maybe it should!

I have some authority on this subject.

You are missing a point here Specifier...

Do you seriously think Mrs Tcmtech is excercising authority here ? Playing blonde is a strategy, not an IQ deficiency!

As a woman, do you not consider the possibility that Mr Tcmtech is undergoing training?

Been there, done that, more than once!

Ahem... should read "not excercising authority"

My company makes a broken finger style level switch approved for volatile liquids, P/N 205 KS 120 that can be wired to a piezo device. Call me to discuss.

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Cost is 26.95

You could look into one of these and both of you enjoy a cold drink while watching the dog run in fear : )

Lawn Mower

Drew K

Personally I rather like mowing the lawn myself and don't have an issue with doing it.

The main bug for me is having someone who wants to mow it for me but doesn't want to take the full responsibility of running and maintaining the machine properly which takes at most a minute to do out of every three hours of run time. That's what bugs me.

In the past I have left the mower sit for over a week before she felt that the yard needed mowing and she filled the tank up and managed to get it running just fine herself so I know the capacity and knowledge is there to do it.

My next step in this is to fix up my old 1968 Cub Cadet 122 mower and have that waiting on standby. When her fancy hydrostatic drive 20 HP one hand steering mulching mower runs out of gas its time to fire up the old 12 Hp cast iron 3 speed strong arm steering grass storm blowing relic and finish the job.

I figure about 15 minutes with that should be enough to imprint "check the Gas more often" permanently in to her memory. Plus if it doesn't the nice part about the old Cub Cadet is the fuel tank is above the carburetor so it's self priming when it does run out of gas!

As for those whining about sexism I did state that this was more of a rant than a serious topic!

I would think that if you put the gas into smaller cans (1 or 2 gallon) she could lift them easier and not spill gas on herself or the mower. Might even put some impermeable gloves with the cans so she won't end up smelling of it.

I wouldn't even want to pour into the smallish opening of the gas tank with a 5 gallon can.

(especially if it was one of those idiotic EPA "non-spill" spilling all over freakin' creation cans!)

My wife is more than capable of lifting and handling a 5 gallon gas can. Infact I have seen her lift 100+ pound things without difficulty (until I told her how heavy they were then suddenly she couldn't budge one.)

As far as gas on herself again not a issue. She was painting something the other day and used a rage with gas on it clean the paint off her hands.

Last time I used a rage to clean something I needed to clean up my clean up later...

...just sayin...

Drew K

I for one have never found rage to be for cleaning up anything!

Makes me feel better afterwards though.

Try one of these ATV spare fuel tanks, A simple bracket on the mower should do it.

25 gallon tank & trailer
for lawn mowers and ATVs.

Maybe you can adapt this↑ to your lawn mower. Enough gas for the whole season. What is your season? 4 months?

Well today I was pondering on making a gas can holder that fits behind the seat so she always has a full can with her.

I figure I can get two of those five gallon military surplus Jerry cans to fit nice and neat back there without adding any extra weight or causing any other problems.

It may be what's the most rational fix for this yet!

But you still have the priming problem. I do like the idea of the inline bulb pump. I might look for something that was a bit more rugged though.

Drew K

If it works on a snowmobile or boat it should do just fine on a lawnmower.

True.

Drew K

You could easily retrofit a petcock from an ATV or motorcycle with "reserve" on it, just as a failsafe to keep from running from the West 40 to East Bumble in the event it does run out. That, along with an inline bulb pump for priming, is an easy fix, relatively speaking, compared to installing a thermistor and piezo alarm, though the thermistor in the link below can be had for under $3 and a piezo for about $20.

These links may help with the alarm and thermistor idea, and can be adapted for your application, if that floats your boat:

Piezo alarm datasheet: http://challengeelectronics.com/downloads/piezo_alarms/continuous_alarms/CE-CU628BS.pdf

GE thermistor datasheet: http://www.farnell.com/datasheets/172544.pdf

Thermistor above available here: http://www.newark.com/ge-measurement-control-ge-sensing/rl2004-582-97-d1/ntc-thermistor/dp/20F735?Ntt=20F735

Instructions here: http://www.st-riders.net/index.php?topic=976.msg6775#msg6775

Actually I have been looking at the low fuel sensor systems for motorcycles. Most of them can be bought for less than $20 and many are already designed to trigger a light so triggering a piezo alarm is not a problem as well.

As far as piezo alarms go I scrap out industrial electronics systems from time to time so I have loads of them! I have a few high output ones that can make a persons teeth itch when they go off if you are within 20 feet of them!

That actually sounds like an excellent idea! There are several pieces of machinery that I'd love to put "idiot alert" alarms on, maybe along with a video camera to record reactions!

Here's is something, she can both carry extra fuel and eat the grass...