Patent ID: 6978590

Claim:
A lawn mower blade and under-deck cleaning assembly for cleaning the under side of the mower blade compartment comprising in operative combination: a) a generally flat, elongated, main mower blade having cutting edges along opposite longitudinal leading edges and a central mounting opening for securing to a mower motor drive shaft, and a plurality of small bit openings positioned along the longitudinal axis of the blade in the area between the central mounting opening and transverse ends of the blade, the central mounting and bit openings each extending through the blade; b) a plurality of elongated, generally cylindrical, resilient bits, each bit having a head at one end, a projecting portion having a shoulder disposed spaced from said head by the cross-sectional thickness of said main mower blade, said spacing between said shoulder and said head defining a neck portion, said projecting portion tapering to a flexible, elongated rod portion comprising more than half the length of said bit, said rod portion is slightly smaller in cross-sectional diameter than the diameter of a bit opening of the blade, the head being larger than the diameter of each of the bit openings of the blade to prevent the bit from being pulled through the bit opening; and c) each elongated rod portion of said bit may be inserted into one of the plurality of bit openings from a bottom side of the blade and said projecting portion inserted by force through said bit opening so that each bit is retained at its neck within each bit opening and secured between the head and shoulder of said projecting portion, the elongated rod portion of the bit extending generally upwardly and perpendicularly from a top surface of the blade a length sufficient to flexibly contact the underside of a mower deck under which said main blade is mounted to effect a cleaning action by scraping the underside of said deck as said mower blade is rotated.