Estimated reading time at 200 wpm: 5 minutes
Well, some people must be laughing and so am I! Yes – I know I’m crazy. Tell me something I don’t know! 😆 This article is my ‘notes’ in case I need to refresh my memory in the future. It may help someone out there.
So the backstory to this was from my previous post Petrol is not just petrol a few days ago. Here it is again.
Whether or not you agree our Fat Disclaimer applies
I bought a generator in Sept 2020 in preparation for an apocalypse following on COVID. Right – have a laugh because no apocalypse happened. But hey I can chose to spend my money as I wish just like the next person. It was a 3000W output thing. Anyways the generator was not used for more than 5 hours over the next 4+ years. I only started it up every 6 months or so. About 2 years ago I realised it developed what’s known as ‘hunting and surging’. That’s when its speed varies in a rapid sequence on idle, like it’s about to die. In addition it did not deliver power if I attached any device – it would cut off. I attempted to clean the carburetor myself about a year ago but that did not help. There was no pressing urgency for me to go get it repaired.
Okay – so I’ve been doing some more research on carburetors and petrol. It turns out that petrol left for more than about 6 months tends to degrade and form gum of some sort. That gum is what gets into carburettors and gums them up, leading to ‘hunting and surging’. So I learned a lot about carburettors thanks to many generous people on YouTube. Carburettors don’t normally appear to have an obvious blockage when the cause hunting and surging. What I discovered was that they are very sensitive to microscopic layers of gunk.
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After studying from loads of YouTube vids, I spent maybe around 4 hours in total: cleaning the carburettor and testing the generator. The core problem was oxidised petrol that caused gunk to block up very small jets in the carburettor. After the first clean, it the generator would not start. I left it for 3 days, and thought about it. Then I realised the problem might have been with the air-fuel mixture.
So today 2025-04-05, I adjusted the mixture and it started up. But then it cut off after about 30 seconds. This happened on three attempts. I was thinking it might be a fuel line blockage. After those checks there was no fuel blockage. Then I’m back into the carburettor again. Ahhh…but as I was dismantling it, I spotted a small spring lying there on top the box I was working on the last day. Anyways, I took apart the carburettor and realised that it fell out from part of the solenoid control on top the carburettor. It was quite fiddly to get that back in place. It took about 30 minutes but eventually it was properly placed. I did a second cleaning of the carburettor again while it was stripped down.
Then I put the carburettor back together and in place. I left the air filter open without the filter, in this testing phase. Then bingo! In one pull of the cord, the generator started. It sounded a bit shaky at first. Not unexpected as it had not been run for about 2 years. So, I let it run for about 5 mins and it steadied up. Then I did the load-testing as can be seen in the video below.
It’s running smooth and stable. Well I have to say it’s working better than when I first got it. One or two gentle pulls of the cord is enough to get it started😀. When it was first purchased I would have to pull the cord rather ‘violently’ about 6 times! 🙄
I added STA-BIL to my jerry can of fresh petrol and then filled the generator tank half-full. STA-BIL has been well recognised over many years as a good preservative for petrol. Where did I get it? Jeez – how about Amazon?
Conclusion
Mission accomplished. Total cost of new tools was about £38. Some might have wondered why I went DIY. It’s this simple-I don’t like being ripped off. I’m pretty certain I would have been charged between £50 and £100 to troubleshoot and fix it. You know these people, they usually give some yarn to try and bump up the cost. Plus I’d have to leave my nice generator at some workshop and hope that it’s fixed within a week or sumik. So is £38 and 4 hours of time worth it? I’d say so. I learned a lot about these small carburettors. I enjoy that sort of thing.
