To do complete the repair described above take the top cover off the 38170 (8mm nut driver, Phillips #2, and 11mm wrench), then take its bottom case off (8mm nut driver). The right wheel has a bracket mounted to the frame by two bolts (11mm and 7/16 wrenches work together), completely remove at least one of these bolts and loosen the other, doing this allows the wheel mount bracket to rotate out of the way while removing the recoil starter cover. Finally, extract four bolts securing the recoil starter’s frame to remove it and its surrounding cover from the motor.

To replace the rope, I fully removed the recoil starter wheel from its spring assembly – this probably isn’t necessary, but I wanted to inspect it and make sure nothing was broken or bent. The spring on mine looked perfect and rewrapping it was easy following these instructions. To wrap new rope around recoil starter wheel, I looked down at the recoil starter wheel and, after inserted a new 5-foot section of rope and tying a couple knots through the hole in the starter wheel, I rotated it clockwise to get the rope on it. I then flipped the starter wheel over and pressed the spring and its metal shell/cup into the bottom side of the plastic recoil wheel. Be sure the spring’s ends are seated into the metal shell/cup, otherwise it won’t later wind up. I also intentionally broke off a piece of plastic from one side of the recoil starter wheel’s outer rim so that I could later insert a screwdriver and easily wind up the wheel when it is reinserted into the metal cover.

I believe I wound the recoil starter wheel 3 times counter-clockwise. After winding the spring up, I used the hole created by the broken plastic to feed the rope through the cover’s rope pull hole and it was tight, I only had a couple inches of slack. If three times winding seems too much for your spring, back off to only 2 times (I may have done wound it twice, I was distracted and forgot to jot down my count).

I’ll bring it out to test later today when I pick up some fresh gas. Surely the spark plug will need cleaning before it wants to fire. So much maintenance!

** UPDATE 3-13-2026 **
The above crummy repair lasted barely a year and then the spring cup crumpled. Maybe I over-tensioned the spring when I reinstalled it? To fix it today, I headed to Cedar Engine Repair in Minneapolis. They had a used recoil starter available for $5, sold! I drilled out the rivets in my old recoil starter, over-drilled the existing holes in the used recoil starter, and fastened the used recoil starter to the snowblower with 4 bolts and nuts I had in my extras bin – these better not fail me, I used lock washers on the nut sides. While inside, I sanded the spark plug down a little bit. I also accidentally knocked off the wind vane and was worried I broke it, but Ella helped me figure out where to reattach it – her eyes are the best!

Now will top it off with fresh 50:1 oily gas and time to let ‘er rip… This repair took me a couple hours, but I think it was worth it. Cedar Engine Repair had two 38170 machines for sale, one new and one used, the latter was fetching $425.