opinions requested - briggs intek vs kohler courage

[keakar]

I have two mowers and I will be putting the best of everything into one to keep and the other to sell as a running mower that's a little rough around the edges.

heres the deal, I have a Toro LX 426 with the briggs engine that runs smooth and strong with no problems. the issues are the cutting deck is borked up bad and I got it sorted out mostly and it works but it doesn't cut evenly so the deck needs replacing (big $$$)

so I went buy a Toro LX 425 for a parts mower mainly just to get a good replacement deck for my mower and was blown away because it was still shiny all over even the pulleys under the deck were in like new condition with no rust or anything. the mower does have some unknown steering isues to sort out (steering wheel just spins freely) that I hope is a simple fix by replacing the gear.

the only question is since I plan to keep the mower I just got with the 20 hp kohler courage engine, should I pull that motor and put my known to be good strong solid running dependable 20 hp briggs intek motor in it?

im not sure the kohler "courage" brand engines are any better then the briggs inteks and I know most kohler engines are usually known for good quality except I have herd a lot of bad things about the courage version kohler motors being cheap lower quality and not as reliable version so I don't know if I should stick with the briggs I have been using or let it go and use the kohler and ignore the stories of how crappy the courage version engines are.

so what are your opinions on the intek vs the courage engines? both are lower end in quality and durability as basic entry level lower priced riding mower engines

now please don't base opinions on briggs vangards or kohler commander series motors since they are made to be much better quality engines then the ones I am comparing here.

thanks in advance for any input you can offer