How to Remove a Square Drive Starter Clutch on a Briggs & Stratton 3 HP

Power off your lawn mower and give the engine time to cool.

Open the front hood over your lawn mower. Find the oil plug, which sits beside the dipstick on the bottom left of the Briggs & Stratton 3 HP engine.

Find the thin, black ignition wire that connects to the spark plug on the right side of the engine. Follow the ignition wire to the back of the engine assembly, where it rests beside the circular engine flywheel. Remove the bolts on the flywheel's cover, or shroud, with a socket wrench.

Pull off the flywheel shroud. Remove the flywheel's center nut with your wrench.

Place a flywheel pulley over the exposed flywheel. Lower the arms of the pulley over the outside of the flywheel.

Tighten the bolt on the center of the pulley with your socket wrench until the pressure causes the Briggs & Stratton 3 HP engine's flywheel to pop completely free.

Remove the oil pan below the Briggs & Stratton 3 HP engine by taking its bolts out with your wrench.

Locate the starter clutch shaft, which is clearly visible beneath the engine now that you removed the oil pan. It runs up to where you removed the flywheel. There are two bolts along the shaft. Remove both with your socket wrench.

Look where you removed the Briggs & Stratton flywheel. The top of the shaft is located at the center of the engine assembly. Strike this point with a rubber mallet to dislodge the clutch shaft entirely.