Sounds like time to make a note of the muffler location and stay clear of it.

well, now i'm wearing welding gloves over my other gloves. that off button is hard to reach without getting close to the muffler. But snow pants are expensive, so you are right about that.

If you are pretty handy, you could put a kill switch somewhere away from the muffler.

It isn't glowing red, is it?

their is only one wire for the kill switch,,, it grounds the ignition,,, just extend the wire and place the switch elsewhere. you can actually just stick the wire to any bare metal and cut the engine off, the switch is just a helper,, if the switch is an intrigal part and cant be moved easy, just get a cheap universal kill switch to place. then if the muffler is sticking out just make a safty shield and place over it. you might be able to find a miffler shaped diffeerently that can be used on it which will give you better clearance.

What about a metal grill frame box over the muffler. Someone must sell it.

I notice this is an old thread but I will toss in my .02 worth. I have fixed mowers in the past when some of the safty stuff started going bad by just running the kill wire up the handle and wiring it through household wall switch and grounding the other side. You have to remember that "OFF" is actually "ON", because you are just turning on the kill circuit. Dont forget to turn it "OFF" before you try to start it again or you will get very tired cranking the thing. It will cost you about 50 cents for parts.