Before Wood Chips

I was reading an article this week from the OPEI and it was talking about a company Ariens just purchased. It has set a new lawnmower land speed record of like 86 mph.

A few years before I started working with chainsaw training, actually my first full time job repairing lawnmowers and chainsaws, I worked for a Snapper Dealership in Hiram, Ga. Ben and Benny Strickland were the owners (1976).

Bob Vincent from AMED, the Snapper distributor, had a Snapper that had been adapted to ride around on its back wheels and roller doing wheel stands. Bob used it to draw a crowd along the highway and parking lots of open houses. Can you imagine how that worked on a busy Saturday? Bob was a real salesman! He later arranged for me to take a job working the parts and warehouse at AMED. Anyway, the story has more...

Before I left Strickland's, Benny Strickand and I built one to do the same. Then I came up with a way to make it go fast. I reversed the chain drive in the gearbox, using all original Snapper parts and that thing would almost fly. We had our local law enforcement contact his friend and we had it clocked by the GA State Patrol Radar at 52 mph.

We thought since we had this thing we would put out a challenge to other shops. We soon got a taker on the race proposition. I believe his name was Mike from the shop at Stovall and Co. Now Mike had used some older Snapper gearing combinations that offered the ability to not only run fast but get there quickly. He met us for a drag race at Southeastern Dragway in Dallas GA. I won, mike blew a tire. He was OK, just scratched up a bit but he was done with racing he said and it gave me the win. Mike definitely had a better gear ratio setup and since he was retiring from the sport early, he openly divulged his secrets. I now had the fastest machine worldwide, I thought...

Benny and Bob Vincent had told the Snapper factory in McDonough, GA about our machine. A few months later Snapper challenged us to a race and wanted to film it. Their slogan at that time was Snapper Fast. We set up the grudge match back at Southeastern Dragway. Benny had us all decked out in Red shirts with Strickland's Snapper on them. We were not only fast we were cool!

Well, Snapper did show up with the machine and five of their engineers. They had a new 28" HiVac with a 13hp? Briggs engine. They backed that thing off the trailer and was doing burnouts with it, literally. A true Funny Mower bracket lawnmower. This thing was sharp! I got beat bad that nght at the Dragway. They turned 62 MPH. Blew the grass right off our mower. Snapper left with a great commercial video that they later decided not to use. I was told at that time that I had the first fast Snapper riding mower that they knew of - but it wasn't the fastest any longer.

Well, that's faster than this old guy wants to cut grass now! But it was a fun time in this old Wood Chips past!


Good Sawing!
Tim Ard

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