The steel wound wire housing on the control handle cable assembly may be broken, which will cause loss of control/use of the handle and wire, and the non-tightening of the belt. That will require a new replacement cable, unless you have a great excess of cable. And, some of those models use the belt cover panel to keep the belt in place, so if your control wire is not working correctly, that may caue looseness in the belt area, causing it to fall off! Now, some models had a notched plate, bolted to the engine, which kept the belt in position-didn't rub on the belt when tight, but when loose, it kept the belt in place, but loose.

I can't believe all of the responses, thank you so much! I'm saving all of them and am going to go through the suggested plants to choose some for the space. The area in question is rather dry, although this spring/summer has been on the dry side so far, so many of our garden beds are dryer than usual. I think this spot tends to get less watering from us because the one spigot in the front of our house hasn't worked since we moved here and it's a pain to drag the backyard hose all the way around to the front. DH has promised to get down in the crawl space and fix the darned thing before next spring, so hopefully with a well-placed soaker hose under a layer of mulch it will be more moist next year. In the event that the area does remain rather dry, are there any shade-loving perennials that will flourish in dry shade? The idea of having a tree there is intriguing, but I do think that the area is a bit small---one of my husband's pet peeves is trees that are planted too close to houses. The window there is pretty much our one and only 'view' from anywhere inside the house, so we'd like to keep it unobstructed. We also have so many trees in our yard (especially in that half of the yard), I think the idea of adding more makes us start to panic a little ; ) This is a horrid photo (I think it's from the realtor) but you can see the three huge trees on the right (one is a double-trunk); there is also an enormous maple directly behind the garage. http://pattycakedesigns.com/house6.jpg I'm not positive, but I don't think that the garden stays warm in the winter. We planted three hydrangea there last fall, and none of them made it through the winter. Maybe the freezing wind blowing in from the west hits full-on whatever's planted there? We live a block from the shore of Lake Erie, so it does tend to get pretty cold/windy here in the winter. I do like the idea of a birdbath or some other small structure there (I think our four cats would enjoy drooling from the windowsill), and I think we have one in the shed that we aren't using now. I saw one the other day that had been planted with annuals that were positively dripping over the edges of the bowl; I seem to remember DH moaning about having to scrub out the birdbath more than he liked, maybe if we don't use it for a birdbath per se we can use it as a focal point for some fancy annuals? Other than impatiens, what annuals grow well in the shade? Begonias? I've been trying to come up with some more ideas for plants that might look interesting through the winter (since it's winter here for about six months, or at least seems that way, especially when it snows in April). Any thoughts for anything other than holly? We're not big evergreen/dwarf conifer fans. We love climbing hydrangea (left one behind at the old house, I still mourn losing it); if I wanted to start one up the siding there to the left, what would be the best way to support it? I'm guessing the siding is too slick for it to hold itself up. A trellis? If so, how do you attach a trellis to the siding, or would you just anchor the bottom in the ground? My goal now is to try and get the unwanted flowers moved to the backyard somewhere so that I can hopefully plant some shade perennials here in the fall. I moved the Clara Curtis this morning (from the way it spread in just one year, I have a feeling it's going to take over whereever I put it) and am going to move those sickly-looking geraniums when we hack them back in a few days. I need to get that poor hydrangea out of the corner; would it be better to wait until fall to move it, or could I do it now? Thanks again for everyone's responses, this is all fascinating and so helpful! Amy Here is a link that might be useful:

willard, you've posted that list before, but I guess I've never given it serious thought until now (well, now I have that problem). I see a few items on the list that may apply. -now that there's very little rain I've been having to water it with city water, which has a very high calcium content, among other things. -I haven't seen as many bees around as I used to see, but I don't imagine that's the issue when pods aren't even opening. - I've seriously cut back on the nitrogen I give it because I have heard before that it has a negative effect on pod development. -size of pot, yeah, they're 3-4ft tall in 5 gallon buckets, 2 per bucket. that's probably an issue. -too much grower attention, guilty as charged. -there's plenty of light to be had, and air circulation is never an issue. -too low humidity is never an issue here in FL, but what about too high humidity? I'd imagine that could make the pollen clump together and not do its job. am I off base on that one? so it looks like 5 out of 11 on that list may/do apply to me. I guess I'm screwed. there's nothing I can do about the water, short of having to filter it, I guess I can put them in the ground like I did with my brain strain (which currently has 10 pods growing, one of which is mostly ripe), and I don't suppose I could bribe the bees to come back, could I? Josh, I've never fully understood what I was supposed to do when they tell you the strength to mix the fert. is the intention that you mix one tbsp per gal (or whatever it says) and water the plants fully with that? what I usually do is mix slightly below recommended strength, and only give each plant a little bit of the fert-water mix (I mix up a 2 gal watering can, and divide it roughly evenly among my 10 pots), then come back and finish watering with normal water, that way I don't over fertilize. am I doing it wrong? I've never seen any leaf burn. but yes, the leaves that fall off are usually still quite green, but not really all that healthy looking.

And as it turns out, the grand daughter of the couple who own this house, lived with me for a few weeks over 25 years ago. The lady's daughter is married into my brother in laws family. It's a small world. Ice chunk falls through a house It was determined that the chunk of ice fell off a West Jet airliner. I'm glad nobody was hurt. West Jet said they are going to pay for all the repairs to the home. This house is literally less than a five minute drive from my house. I'm in the next neighbourhood!