One of my goals is to be able to rebuild a small internal combustion engine. I want to do this mostly because I love fixing things and working with my hands and I figured finding a lawn mower engine someone would let me take apart would be a lot easier (and also easier to move) than a car engine whilst maintaining the same principals.

Me typing the craigslist ad (and also displaying how not to have good posture).

Now, I understand the basic idea of how an internal combustion engine works. A piston is moved up and down by the rapidly expanding combustion of ignited petroleum. This motion is then transferred into a rotating motion that spins lawn mower  blades, or wheels, or whatever needs to be spun. I obviously don’t know much about engines (thus my endeavoring on this project). Luckily for me, my local library (at which I work) has digitized, via EBSCO, nearly every small engine in existence’s repair manual. These manuals are where I will start in learning how to fix a small engine. My final goal is that I can completely disassemble and then reassemble a small engine and have it work when I’m done. I have a feeling that this may take the destruction of several small engines; thus, I will need several small engines. I started with a call to my friends on facebook which turned up exactly zero small engines. Today, I have written a craigslist post (http://fortcollins.craigslist.org/wan/3125203694.html) calling on the people of Fort Collins to supply me with their unwanted lawn mowers and rototillers, offering $25 dollars in exchange. Hopefully, this shall turn up some results.