Introduction
We compost everything we can. When full, which takes around 4 or 5 years, the pile contains a little over 3 cubic yards of dirt. We produce more than we use, so when it's full we advertise on places such as the local Freecycle or Facebook groups and give it away. It seems not many people compost any more, and pesticide and herbicide free dirt usually goes in a couple of days. One year, someone turned up with backhoe and took all of it!
Our compost
For a small garden, we can produce a lot of material for the compost, sometimes I wonder where it all comes from. We only have a smallish cherry tree, but all our neighbours have several different types of trees, so every year there's loads of leaves that end up in our yard. Then there's the grass clippings, and various offcuts of wood. I keep the larger peices in a separate pile and used to use an axe and chop the larger pieces up and put it straight on the compost, but in 2003, my wife, Patty, bought me a MTD Yard Machines Chipper Shredder 462D to help. Now practically everything goes through the machine before going on the compost.
MTD Yard Machines Chipper Shredder 462D
The machine is now around 20 years old and still going strong, despite my lack of skill and knowledge about these small engined machines. This page is about it and the simple maintenance I do on it.
Safety
Remember that this is a powerful machine. It has no humanity, conscience, soul or feel guilt. It does not care whether it is tearing apart a two inch thick tree branch or your hand.
Be Careful!
General Information
MTD Yard Machines Chipper Shredder, Model 462D with Briggs & Stratton 5hp Engine.
Check the manuals, but here's what is used in mine:
Spark plug - NGK BKR5ES 2460 or equivalent
Oil - 10W-30
The engine needs very little maintenance, or at least, I do very little. In Indiana, the machine is just shoved in the shed for the winter which lasts around six months. For its first use in the spring, I check the oil level, check the air filter, change the spark plug, and fill with fresh fuel. After that, I simply check the oil and fuel levels before each use.
Gasolene or petrol is strange stuff. It sits as oil for millions of years underground, then as soon as it is extracted and refined, it has a shelf-life of just a couple of months. For this reason, any fuel left in the cans I use at the end of the season in put into the car and the cans refilled with fresh fuel at the beginning of the next season. Not doing this is a common cause of the machine not starting at all after lying dormant for a couple of months.
Hopper Collar
The loading hopper is joined to the bpdy of the chipper by two identical plastic mouldings (part no. 731-1710), the hopper collar. These are are made of thick plastic but undergo a lot of stress while being used. Ovr the 20 years of owning the machine, I have had to replace two of these pieces due to them cracking near the bolt holes.
The parts are easily available from places such as Amazon. Replacing the parts is not difficult and does not take long.
Blades
The chipper is well-made but does not cope too well with a lot of wet leaves or other material being put through it. Instead of being chipped cleanly, everything get shredded and eventually clogs up the flail screen inside the discharge chute. Cleaning it is simple, stop the machine, loosen the discharge chute wing knobs, lift the chute on its hinge and pull the matted material out from the flail screen. Sometimes the flail screen's cotter pins have to be pulled from the clvis pins and the flail screen removed to get the material out properly. Apart from safety concerns, be careful when removing the cotter pins. They tend to fly away if not held securely and can be difficult to find again!
If the flail screen has to be cleared often during the day it is probably better to let the material dry out a little more before trying to chip it.
In 2019, when the machine was about 15 years old, I noticed it was jamming more often. It was not because the flail screen need to be cleared but because material was being trapped in the impeller assembly. Clearing these jams is a bit more complicated as the discharge shute, hopper assembly, chipper shute and all the bolts holding the front housing assembly to the rest of the machine have to be removed to be able to pull the trapped material out.
Trapped material in the impeller assembly on the right
This started happening more and more often and was getting irritating to clear. Looking at the blades, I could see what was happening. The blades were dull and chipped, so instead of cutting properly they shredded the material which then got trapped. I could have had the shredder blade and two chipper blades sharpened, but given how old and damaged they were, decided to replace them.
I went with the OEM kit from Amazon, part nos. 781-0490 (chipper blade) and 742-0571 (shredder blade). There are other kits available at 1/3 of the price but I wanted to ensure I did this properly the first time around. Apart from a socket set, a set of Allen keys is required to change the blades.
Special care must be taken that these blades are on tight. Nothing good can come of these things flying loose when the machine is in operation.
Fuel Line
While refuelling the chipper for its first use in May 2023, I realized it was leaking from somewhere near the carburetor. A closer look showed it was actually leaking from the fuel line. Looking at the operating manual that came with the machine I also realized it was next to useless because it only covers things like where the fuel cap and oil dipstick are and not a replacement parts list. After looking online I thought I needed the replacement fuel line, part no. 791874 which is a replacement for part no. 693401.
Replacing the fuel line is not particularly difficult, but I found that the exhaust cover (1/4" and 3/8" bolts), speed control/engine shroud (5/16" bolts), and fuel tank (3/8" bolts), all had to be removed in order to do it. The only awkward part was getting to the rear fuel tank bolts as they are down next to the chipper cover and need an open wrench (spanner) rather than a socket.
Sources & Resources
Even when writing this page the machine was 20 years old. Neither MTD nor Briggs & Stratton appear to be making this equipment any more. The original physical, paper manuals I have are MTD's Chipper Shredder Model Series 462 Thru 465 Operator's Manual, Form No. 770-10048F 5/2003 and Briggs & Stratton 110000 - 210000 Operating & Maintenance Instructions, Form No. 275092-5/03. The provided manuals and download links are the closest I can find to these manuals. Please do further research to match your own machine if you are looking for parts or instructions.
Briggs & Stratton 110400 - 1230400 Operating & Maintenance Instructions, Form No. 274263-10/99 (PDF, 511Kb)
Briggs & Stratton Engines & Parts
MTD Briggs & Stratton Engine Parts
MTD Chipper Shredder Model Series 462 thru 465, Operators Manual, Form No. 770-10048D 7/01 (PDF, 3.9Mb)
MTD Online Manuals
MTD Yard Machines Log Splitter Model 24A-465A000 Parts - Log Splitter? I know, but these are the parts for the chipper/shredder
Fuel - An Aside
I love post-apocalyptic science fiction films. From the creepy and disturbing American "The Day After" (IMDb) or British "Threads" (IMDb) to the Mad Max films. I know one of those is about oil drilling, but in reality that post-apocalyptic future cannot happen. After a couple of months rubber starts to degrade and the fuel would be useless. Gasolene or petrol is strange stuff. It sits as oil for millions of years underground, then as soon as it is extracted and refined, it has a shelf-life of just a couple of months. Mad Max would probably turn out to be something like this: