spins too fast
anonymous asked 6 years ago
Howdy Joe, I have an 8HP briggs ’73 model. I got it off an old Montgomery Wards 26″ SB. I took the governor arm off when I stripped the engine down to clean everything up. I rebuilt the carb, did the solid state conversion to get rid of the points system, and put it all back together, but now it spins crazy fast (between 4000 and 4200 rpm). I have reset the idle screws many times and loosened the governor arm and turned the stub shaft that sticks out of the engine both ways but it still spins way to fast. any ideas?
Joe answered 6 years ago
Dave, There is only way to make the static govonor adjustment. It is either right or wrong there is no in-between. To do this, all of the linkage and carb must be installed. Loosen the gov arm clamp, move the arm with the linkage attached so it takes the carb to the wide open position, rotate the gov shaft in the same direction as it would work to make the arm go into the wide open position. Then while holding everything in this position, tighten the clamp. This sets everything in the wide open position and seats the gov spool into the weights. HOWEVER, if the gov wasn’t set correctly and you ran the engine, since the lever wasn’t in the correct position the spool has nothing to act upon, the result can be that the spool flies off the gov assy and the gov is inoperative even once the correct setting is made. If this is the case, you will have to open the engine to repair the govonor. Joe