This mower was traded in and I was told that it had not run in a long time. The lade that gave it to me said someone tried repairing but it never ran after that. The wasp nest up against the flywheel was evidence of that. The first step in evaluatinG a used mower is determining if the mower has compression. To do that in rudimentary way you have to get the engine brake off of the flywheel and that is often difficult because on old neglected mowers the brake/killswitch cable rusted inside the cable sheath to the point that is inoperable. A special home made tool is used to remove the strong engine brake spring.