Generator Question ?? Up-Dated!

[Bill-N-Donna]

Thought I would ask the experts here a question. I have a Generac 5500XL Model# 9778-7 generator. The last time I had had it running for a significant amount of time was in Jan. It had been a while before that. I have this on a cart for easy access from an out building. After it had been running for about an hour or so I added fresh gas to the tank. I’ve also been using Stable in the gas. I restarted it and it ran for a while. I repositioned the cart and after moving the generator it started to lope. It continued to do that until I shut it down and put it away.

I got it out this past weekend and tried to start it. It ran briefly for a few seconds and then it quit. It sounded to me like the choke wasn’t adjusted correctly. After trying to start it without any success I noticed an amount of gas running out of the filter onto the cart. To me it acts like it’s flooding out but that’s way too much gas coming out IMO. I’ve tried to start it without choking it and I still can’t get it started. I also changed the oil and filter. Anyone have any suggestions as to what to look for first?
Thanks!

[camper4]

I believe your carbs. Float/needle valve is stuck or gummed up. Unless you drain them carb, the gas will evaporate leave a 'varnish' on parts. That happens even with stable.
Basically the carb needs a good cleaning. IMHO?

[H. John Kohl]

I agree with camper4. My first reaction was carburetor and the gas leaking out screams a stuck Float/needle valve. At a minimum cleaning and possibly rebuilding it should correct the problem.
Good luck, let us know what you find.

[randye]

using stabil gas additive, will keep the gas from leaving a varnish and ruining the carb. I have had two past generators that it happened to. This last one is over a year old and still starts easily. I always add some stabil to my gas now.

[lasater]

The same thing happened to me. The solution was an $85 carburator overhaul by a generator tech. Took about 2 hours. The tech found a lot of junk in the float bowl which continually blocked the jets. I discovered that the junk came from my external tank. The fuel I had was badly contaminated. I got rid of the tank and bought a new one. Put new gas in it. The gen runs smoothly now. When I am hooked up, I also make sure I run the generator at least an hour under load each month.

[Bill-N-Donna]

Thanks for the suggestions; I got it running today with the help of a friend. It cost me a grand total of $4.27. The float was bad it was full of gas, very obvious once we opened it up. I’m presently test running it with a load. It is running now and the load for this computer is coming from the generator at this time.


This particular generator has an idle up when under load. If there isn’t any load on it the idle should be a lot less. After replacing the float the idle isn’t idling down like it used to. I don’t know of any way to adjust this. From what I seen it looked like the needle valve had to set just a certain way with the float and there must have been a small difference in it somewhere.