How do I put the spring back in my McCulloch Strimmers pull cord?

I had the same problem with the recoil cord on my Trimmac TM220 not returning, and, after attempts at using different lubricants, decided to strip down and remove a small amount of material from both the nylon pulley shaft and casing spindle (using 80, 320 and 400 grit wet and dry paper in sucession).

I found that the way it works is that the end of the nylon pulley shaft opposite to the ratchet moulding has a slot, one end square cut, the other chamfered. It is the square end which engages the inner end of the spring, which determines the direction of rotation whilst winding in the spring. When successfully re-assembled, the cup and spring will face inwards towards the casing, presenting the smooth face to the pulley.

One installed into the cup, the spring becomes "quiescent" (as in it has no tendancy to unwind).

To re-fit the spring, I first lubricated it with graphite grease. I wound it in by means of inserting the first few inner coils into the cup, placing the edge of the spring through the slot, then placing the cup upside down onto a metal plate and turning the pulley wheel anti-clockwise by hand whilst holding the cup below it in place with finger tips. This has the effect of pulling the free end of the spring through the slot and into the cup. It's pretty hard work, (sometimes a push on the free end of the spring helps it in) but doing it this way does avoid the whole lot flying out into your face. You can take rests by placing a weight on top of the pulley wheel so's avoiding any tendancy for the whole lot to fly apart whilst you drink your tea.

Once the whole spring has been wound in, whilst maintaining downwards pressure on the pulley, rock it alternately clockwise and anti-clockwise, whereupon, in my case I was able to feel the tension lift from the pulley and was able to withdraw it from the cup, exposing the end of the spring when viewed through the centre hole of the cup.

I was able to carefully slide the cup (spring facing inwards) onto the casing spindle and engage the outer spring loop onto the casing lug, then ease the pulley shaft onto the spindle, taking care that the slot in the shaft end aligned with the spring end, until in went fully home. After screwing in the retaining tags, one turn anti-clockwise ensured enough tension such that the cord would we fully drawn onto the wheel after pulling.

So far it is 100% successful

Alan
May 2008

Having trouble myself with this one ,had same problem ....once you have the spring on the metal disc and the plastic kog on top of it how do you get it back in the casing ?????? with out it going TWANG!!!!!

IAN
March 2007

Place the metal dish/washer on a flat surface with the rim up and starting from the outside, feed the spring in after securing the end in the slot in the outer rim. It's a little tricky but not too difficult.

Glanville
July 2006