Fire In the Hole!!! New Chinese made $20 carb on my G1A3 with a J31 engine, works !

[bolt37]

Guys,

I bought a G1-A3 1982 5 or 6 years ago to use on my farm. It was apparently retrofitted with a 1985 G1-AM5 J31 engine. It runs like a top and hasn't had many problems at all, and I work it like a dog.

Recently, it started showing puddles of fuel under it after it sat for a while. It was then hard to start, and once it did it took a while to burn out the fuel that apparently dumped into the head. Fuel would gush out the clamp joint at the exhaust! The last time, a spark caught it on fire while my wife and I were sitting on it! A quick blast from the cart-mounted 1A10BC fire extinguisher got it out before ANY damage was done.

I knew it needed a carb, as I thought the float needle and seat were worn, or the float had just sunk, therefore draining the fuel bowl forward after shutting off. After disassembly, that was exactly the case.

I put one of those $20 carbs from eBay (Chinese made) expecting it to be a waste of effort, but I was unable to locate an original Mikuni carb or a carb kit.

It fired right up, not a single adjustment necessary, no leaks, plenty of power! This was the second time in many life, on many types of vehicles, that the cheap carb route worked.

The moral of my story is two fold: Keep a fresh fire extinguisher mounted, and sometimes cheap stuff works. If there was an OEM or rebuild kit I would never have gone this way, but glad I did!

Take 'er easy.