Hi Lads,
I am glad to report the mower is all done and been tested and is now nice and quiet steers better and cuts nice, not to mention the owner being very happy with her 'new' mower, I tested it to make sure all was well but she is now itching for the grass to grown even a touch so its a good enough excuse to get her revamped mower out lol.
Here is the rest of the job.

First all the top plates were tacked in place.



Then a new skirt , clamped and tacked into position .



Due to the old repair having a bar welded along the front with too much old snotty weld to grind off there ended up a section to be patched with a strip as the old skirt was about half an inch deeper than the new strip of metal I had to hand so this front area was patched in to replace the cut out section. The underside where the rot had been cut out was tacked to the new top and the areas filled with car body filler to seal them so grass would not pack between the two layers of plate.




The tacked seam between the top plates and the skirt was welded leaving alternate gaps then worked back around filling in the gaps to try to stop too much distorsion, this seemed to work as the whole thing stayed nice and flat to the floor.



Next I marked around the skirt with chalk on the floor and made a new bar to beef up the bottom of the skirt. I only has some 14mm black bar but in three short bits so by trial and error bent these bits in the vice to follow the chalk line then welded them together. Then welded them to the bottom of the new skirt.






The underside was undersealed then the blades , pulleys etc all built back up and the top side seam sealered around the welded areas.






One last hitch I noticed just in time to alter before painting , the return spring for the deck lowering lever was not a very good design so I managed to find a better spring in my scrap box and welded a strong washer for it to hook on to, this was a better spring and more secure way of fixing it than the original.



Next a coat of etch primer.



Then a few coats of a very dark grey satin finish that matched the rest of the dark bits on the tractor as I had no orange paint and would not have got a match for the original anyway as faded with age. The grey was darker than it looks here , it was hot sunny day so baked it dry in no time.



This it the finished job all back together, looking quite smart if I say so myself.







It should last a good few more years now and continue to give good service, my old friend is delighted , was nice to see her face when she saw it was not just a few horrible patches clagged on with sealer and snot weld like the last time the lawn mower dealer 'fixed' it lol.

Cheers Mick