OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Welcome to Outdoorking Forum HELP Area Site Problems/Suggestions and Updates Briggs Vanguard governor problem

Hi everyone. It’s been a long time since I last posted. I am having the devil of a time trying to setup a Briggs and Stratton Vanguard 24 HP motor on a friends lawn tractor.
The engine was running rough, and was hard to keep running, initially. After spraying some carb cleaner into the intake, and adjusting the armature gap for the ignition coils, the engine speed ran up and down (hunting), which led me to believe that the governor needed adjustment.
I have a copy of the Briggs service guide for these engines, ( this one is a 440000 series ).
The manual shows an adjustment procedure that does not work for me. It says to hold the governor shaft in place in the farthest clockwise position, while making sure that the throttle plates are in the wide open position, and then tightening the bolt that clamps the governor arm to the governor shaft. Various u-tube videos I have seen state the same thing.
The engine runs at full speed, ( out of control ), after adjusting the governor like the manual said.
In the early stages of trying to adjust the governor, I made some mistakes, like having the governor shaft fully counter-clockwise, and/or mistaking the throttle fully open versus fully closed position.
Trying to run the engine after the mistakes resulted in a very loud clicking sound coming from the motor. I immediately shut the engine down when I heard that sound, both times, but I can’t help but wonder if I have destroyed the governor assy inside the motor.
The spring connections and operation for the governor on this engine don’t make sense to me.
Can anyone enlighten me, please.
Thank you in advance.
Cheers.
Andy

I think this post may have gone to the wrong area. If so, my apologies.

Hi Andy,
I can't help with the governor, I had a 16hp Vanguard with similar problems some months ago so I abandoned the governor and fitted a motorcycle carby to it so I could manually control the revs. Not sure if it helps but all I was able to come up with

Probably not your problem, but I thought it worth mentioning for the smaller B&S engines. I've had problems with the governing due to an air vane getting too tight or stuck once the spindle is tightened down on to the coil. The only solution I've found is to file or sand some of the plastic off the bottom of the spindle until it swings free again. When stuck the engine runs just as you say, it just goes flat out and won't idle down. Another quick fix is to loosen the bolt on the coil a bit that holds the spindle, but then you could risk the coil coming loose.

I find a lot of the newer B&S are pains to get to idle e.g. Sprint series. As their name suggests, they do just seem to want to keep sprinting ahead rather than tune back to an idle. Some people have had good results by bending the arm that the spring attaches to or manually stretching the spring. Perhaps a slightly longer spring might do the job in the case of the much larger Vanguard engine? Just a thought.

Second this on the old 148cc ones vint mow, I have had to do this on a few occasions as well. its like the plastic expands as it ages, or maybe its something with the coil slightly delaminating.

Unfortunately, this one uses an internal governor - like a quantum. for what they lack in precision, the air vane governors do make up for in ease of service


As an aside, the main issue with the sprint not going to idle is both standardisation and emissions. Emissions meant the idle circuit was cut in the early 90s (ie pulsaprime carby) but still running fairly rich meant curb idle of 1750rpm. The twin spring came in in 1997 (California emission CARB tier 1 implementation) so to prevent surging at leaner mixtures they upped the idle speed to around 2600 rpm. It was also so machines like pressure washers didnt surge so much when you let go of the trigger.

Most machines in the usa were fixed throttle by that point so it didn't matter as much

And this was the reason I fitted a motorcycle carby on this machine so the revs could be controlled by the operator. I didn't go as far as fitting a twist grip to it but I did give it some thought.