The yellow one looks almost identical to the 1950s Qualcast my father bought new back then, but if I recall correctly the Qualcast was orange. It also had a clutch pull-rod that I can't see on that yellow one. The clutch pulled the engine upward to tighten the V belt.
Edit: The clutch didn't pivot the engine, it pulled an idler pulley onto the inside of the V belt to tension it. My thanks to Joe Brown for putting me back on the rails, and doing it in his usual gentlemanly manner by PM.
The electrical conversion you refer to is just fitting an old-time car DC generator on brackets, removing the V belt that drove the mower, and fitting it between the engine's drive pulley and the generator. It looks as if he's fitted the voltage regulator (also an ancient electromechanical one, to suit the generator) to the opposite side of his generator mounting bracket. It would make a decent portable battery charger, if you could make do with a charging rate of only 12 amps (which is all those old generators could produce, and was enforced by the third solenoid in that voltage regulator, to keep from burning out the generator or using up its carbon brushes too quickly). At least he was using a regulated voltage - a lot of people making "tenant's improvements" to engine driven equipment in those days didn't, and ruined the battery they were charging as well as the generator.
Last edited by grumpy; 12/08/11 05:35 AM. Reason: Correct an error of fact
