Ot: Troy-bilt Snow Blowers

When I ran this Chinese Powermore engine out, the carb jets got clogged and I had to remove and clean them.

The old Tecumseh (USA) engines are a different story. My neighbor bought a used Ariels with Tecumseh and it runs like a horse.
He does little or nothing, and it starts right up.

I am using stabil and keeping it full, and it starts first pull.
 
Mine has a Canadian made Sno-King 13 HP engine Nelson, nothing stops it and it's 28 years old. The unit itself is a Yard Man. 33 inch cut.

"Billy G"
 
I should have bought my snow blower like I buy my tools, old American.

My neighbor's Ariens is awesome with the Tecumseh. The height is even adjustable, whereas I have to loosen some nuts and manually raise the sliders.
 
I've been using Stabil for quite a few years now, but I use it year round. Every time the gas can gets filled, Stabil gets put in. I never drain the tanks, and never run them dry, instead I keep them full at all times. Haven't had any trouble with the tractor, lawn mower, string trimmer or anything else.

This is what I do...
With the two stroke engines... mix the oil at the same time.. (put the oil and sta-bil in the empty gas can first, then fill it, with ethanol free gas). Google 'pure-gas'... a listing of stations that sell it. Around here, pure gas is about 15% more than regular unleaded.

I have a backpack blower that has never had anything other than non-ethanol gas with proper oil mix and sta-bil in it...
The unit is 14 years old... I put a 'tune up kit' on it at 1o years: new plug, air filter, and fuel filter. It always starts on the first or second pull. Note it never sits more than a month at a time.
 
I run the fuel out of my MTD snow blower with a Tecumseh engine at the end of every winter season. When I fuel it up it up the next winter it starts right up. It is about 20 years old.

I do have some other engines that are balky. A shot of starter spray (ether?) into the air filter or through the spark plug hole always gets them going.

And once they are going... they seem to smooth out and run.
If the gas is 'bad'... they run rough until the bad gas is burned out or diluted with newer gas.

I have not had the bad gas issue in any small engines, other than the Lincoln welder/generator (20HP Kohler V-2 engine).
One time the gas was over 6 months old... the engine ran rough for about an hour... when the tank had enough room for some new gas... when the new gas mixed in, it smoothed out.
 
Well, the stabil is absolutely tops for keeping it running...I have it on the side of the house tarped so that I can get it out when it snows...
 
In all my years running small engines and working on old bikes, I've found that it's best to keep the tanks and carbs full. I've heard that Stabil is hit and miss. There's two flavours as well. One to deal with Ethanol, and the other is regular. Personally, I use Seafoam, and have never had a bad experience with it. My machines usually just run the regular gas with ethanol. I've had stuff sit around for a few years, then fire up like I ran them yesterday. I have a 78 GS1000 that has 5 year old regular ethanol gas in it and it will STILL fire up with minimal cranking and run smoother than my daily rider. I think a lot of the problems people have are due to crappy carb design and materials used. I have a trash pump that's like that. I use it every 5 years or so, but expect to have to clean the carb out before use. That is regardless of whether it's dry, full, drained, put away clean, Seafoam, motor oil, doesn't matter. It's just a piece of junk carb on a Chinese engine from Princess Auto. I don't expect anything more of it than what I get since I paid less for it than a replacement gas cap for a big name brand one.

One other thing. DO NOT assume that a spark plug sparks under compression like it does just laying on top of the cylinder head. I've chased that tail for hours a few times. Tore an almost brand new Hyundai generator all to pieces before realizing the plug wasn't sparking under compression. Thought there was no way the plug could be bad since it only had an hour of run time. Put a $3 plug in there and it fired right up first pull.
 
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