OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Repairs and Maintenance Questions on Engines Questions On Victa Two Stroke Engines Quality of current production Victa 2 strokes

Are the current Victa 2 stroke engines as good as the early 2000's engines?

I have heard people say they now use plastic parts.

However, are they just meaning that they have a plastic carburettor, which has been around for some time?

No, the new ones are Not even made by victa now, the production of them is licensed out to a company in Adelaide. The way To tell them apart is on the proper victa ones, the fins are thinner and closer together, but on the newer ones, the fins are MUCH thicker and further apart.

Thanks, are the new Victa's 2 strokes worth buying still?

The 2 stroke Victas ceased production earlier this year due to non compliance with emissions. All Victa did, apart from manufacturing them in China with the difference as Totally mentioned, was change the plastic top on the motor to make them look like a new model. They also changed the ignition by removing the ignition module. Both ignition types are extremely reliable. Motors are so tough but the carbies can be troublesome but can be sorted. As for buying a new one, whatever suits you, depends if you want to fix an older one up. Only other thing is the steel bases are prone to rust out on the top left hand corner, I clean them out and paint them with fish oil up in the rear area in an attempt to slow the rust. The Chinese bases seem to rust out quicker, probably due to lack of rustproofing at the factory. Not a bad run for a motor to start production in about 1984 till 2016 with only cosmetic changes to the engine cover to give a new model appearance. The base and catcher remained unchanged the whole time, I guess if you get it right, why change it. My opinion is it is the best small engine ever designed and built.
A bit aside but I have a mate who has a gardening business and he has trashed his Honda self propelled a couple of times, I convinced him to buy an old Victa 24, which is a pre plastic carby model so early 70's and he is absolutely stoked with it, things are so tough it will outlast him

Thanks Norm. I also have a c1990's Victa that out performs the bigger 4 stroke self propelled mower in heavy grass. Although its noisy compared to a 4 stroke, it does the job so much faster without having to let the engine recover. Caleb

Victa still list four professional and one domestic 2-stroke models on their website. I dunno if their Adelaide contract assembler has ceased putting the engines together yet, but the writing was big on the wall, early this year.
New national emissions standards for small engine equipment, now due to commence in 2018, will spell the end for sure.

Victa outsourced the casting and machining of the PowerTorque blocks to China some time before 2000, so any later engines were assembled here only. The earliest Chinese blocks had a few QC problems, IIRC.

As said above, the simple way to spot which block you're looking at is the spacing of the cylinder fins. Comparison pic is HERE. The Chinese block engines do seem to be more prone to overheating, not surprisingly.

Thanks Gadge,

Judging by the fins in the link you gave me, this one looks like an Aussie one.

2 strokes have their purpose, such as tackling neglected grass and mowing along slopes.
I saw a guy only yesterday with his 1990s two stroke mower tilted 45� on a severely sloping strip of grass next to a retaining wall.
No way a fancy four stroke would have done it without compromising vital oil lubrication whilst labouring to cut the grass.
You would think some common sense would prevail and they could have some separate emission levels for the two stroke as they are still useful for some.

My mate has been mowing lawns for years and he had forgotten how good the 2 stroke was until I virtually forced him to get a Victa 24. He has rung me every day since he started using it to tell me how good it is. Now he wants me to build him a smaller one a bit easier to get around some of his smaller jobs. He is getting sick of his Hondas because they are not designed to the jobs he is doing. He says the Victa is doing the jobs in half the time the Hondas were taking

Maybe Victa just needs to design to engine to be like the Stihl 4-mix engine just depends how the emissions rules are and of course the patents. Stihl is producing engine that are 4 cycle but use 2 cycle mix which allows all positions operation of brush cutters and back pack blowers. These engines has no separate crankcase oil requirement as the fuel mix provides the oiling. Now these engine are about 1/3 to 1/2 the size of the 160cc Victa engines but I would think the technology behind the Stihl could be applied to an larger engine.

If I remember correctly the main reason a 2 cycle has more power is mainly because it produces power every rev vs the 4 cycle coasting every other rev.

BTW we are seeing 4 cycle trimmers and blowers here with separate oil in the crankcase and they are simply not holding as they are failing because of oiling issues especially from operating at sever angles. At least that what I see in the shop here.

AVB, you only have to look back to motorcycle racing some years ago, they had the 500GP, 500cc 2 strokes. Once they had to drop the 2 stroke, they had to jump the bikes up to 1000cc to keep the lap times similar to the 2 strokes. Tells you something doesn't it.

lets face it dirty emissions from a small two stroke lawn mower engine is not going to do any thing what so ever to improve our air quality, stop climate change, or stop the sky from falling in
some people in power paid lots of money sitting in a office make up stupid laws and know whats best for us!!!

And that's with many of the same riders. I fondly remember Valentino Rossi doing a burnout in front of the Lukey Heights stand, during his victory lap after a 250GP win at Phillip Island, a few years back now.

Both 2 and 4 cycle have greatly improved over the years emissions wise. Went it comes to 2 cycles here many owners opt to buy the cheapest marine grade fuel oils and improperly mix the fuel as they are having to measure the oil mix and are too cheap to even to buy to measuring cup instead opting to buy alcohol, tobacco, and recreational drugs. They are so lazy that trash that can be put a waste container they simply throw it out even when they walk right pass a trash can the next minute. When they change vehicle fluids they simply just pour it out in the environment instead taking it by the recycling center they drive past every day because they are too busy to take the time.

Our 2 cycles here once use fuel mixes of 16:1 but with the synthetics oils are now at 50:1 which is 3X times cleaner than in the past and that don't don't even take into account the improvements in ignition timing and fuel improvements. These synthetic oils fuel oil even work in the older equipment that once use 16:1 when mixed at 50:1.

If we all used fuel efficient equipment would be great but let's face it people are too lazy. They rather opt for hydrostatic rider instead a manual shifted one. I have compare both with the same engine. The hydro based ones even with a clean burning engine still pollutes more as they burn as much as 50% more fuel. My little 38" cut mower uses a lot less fuel to cut the same grass as the bigger mowers; it just takes longer to do the same work. I got 6 acres here. Normally I use about 2 gallons in my mower but with some the customer mowers I use nearly twice that.

If you ever went though the trash people throw indiscriminately you would be surprised just how lazy they are and how uncaring they are. This I have seen personally as I did roadside recycling for about 10 years. They throw just about every thing out including money. I remember one clothes dryer that had a $100 bill inside it.

If we all did our part we would not be the mess that we are in now. I remember when 911 happen here in the States when all the planes were grounded and people were staying off the road except for needed trips. The air within two weeks started becoming clear again.

Just look at places like China, India and other places were are no controls in place. What a mess....

We here are being forced to close out coal burning power stations and are being duped into believing wind and solar will get us by, and in the same breath we are allowing the export of coal to India and China to burn in their power stations. Eventually we will be able to stand proud that we helped save the world, even if as a country we are broke

Norm, IMHO it's not just the 'enviro lobby' that's pushing to shut down coal fired power stations, it's commercial pressures as well. Mind you, these watermelons [i.e. green outside, red inside] do not grasp, or wish to, the factors that enable a stable grid power supply to exist. They're always stumped when I ask them in discussion; OK, which days do you personally wish to have no grid power? 'Cos that's the way they wish to head us.

Pigeons are now coming home to roost big time, from the privatisation mania, for both power generation and grid distribution, that swept Oz in the '80's-'90's.

The bottom line is, that renewable power sources [edit: with the sole exception of hydro] will only ever be capable of 'top-up' generation capacity. They have to have a stable base load generator to synch to. Unless, and until, an electric storage technology capable of storing gigawatt-hours of power is developed.

In the current situation, the base load generators are all privatised, in Vic. Which means that they are required to make yearly profits for their shareholders/owners. Without any regard at all to stable grid supply. I think you can see where this goes - as SA just found out the hard way...

Gadge the problem is the num nutter minority make all the noise and always have the government on a string, how high do you want me to jump. As long as we have this situation Australia is doomed. I doubt we will ever get nuclear power here, I can't believe how many dumb people we have in Australia

A good example would be the Portland Alcoa smelter. They were trying to find a power supply new contract due to the French owned Hazelwood power station being shut down. Then one of the two power supplies was down for maintenance during the rough weather recently and they had to rely on the renewable SA inter-grid system and then it all went out as well, which isn't surprising as it went down a few months ago!

I was talking to one of the workers from Alcoa a few weeks ago who said that it would be easier to close the whole plant as the cost to remove or fix the pot line would be too costly. He said he can guarantee it will be closed soon.

I guess its another job for China while the government complain about unemployment. It'll turn Portland into a ghost town thats for sure.

I really would have thought Portland would have had some back up generation system, if only to produce enough power to keep the pot line from cooling. I had a mate who worked at Bouganville (not sure how it is spelt) when they had the riots and shut the power or gas to the mine and the liquid copper line which ran for miles, solidified and it was all over and I can't recall the mine ever working again

Few people realise just how energy-intensive the Hall-Heroult aluminium smelting process really is. Aluminium is the only metal which is extracted in exactly this way; every other commercial metal can use less energy-hungry processes.

Norm, that plant is just way too power-hungry for backup power to be feasible. The voltage drop across an individual pot is less than 5V DC, but the current through the potline [pots are connected in series] is around 310,000 A. No, that's not a typo!