OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Repairs and Maintenance Questions on Engines Questions On Victa Two Stroke Engines Powertorques - Carby Needle Issues

You used to be able to ask US eBay sellers to find out the cost of posting to Australia and they would usually get back to you with a reasonable price, but now that eBay prescribes sometimes outlandish postage into the price, the seller never seems to want to look for a much cheaper independent alternative. I wonder why!!

The points look ok on my needles but how can you ever be sure, I guess looking at the design it can only be the point that leads to problems. The 3 ridges on the body of the needle would be hard to machine incorrectly but who knows. If we knew what a good needle was supposed to look like, we'd have a better chance of solving this issue.

Problem is you can't be sure the needle is not sticking in the seat, which is one problem as you have no real way of telling if it is priming or not. Then you have the opposite and they won't seat. One problem is the tip of the needle is not central, no idea how they can make them that way. The only sure way is to use a nitrile tipped needle. I have fitted one I modified in a Powertorque and it is working fine but I only had the one needle I ratted from a Tecumesh carby. I'm waiting on a needle and nitrile seat from China to see if I can get one of those to work

Has anybody put a G3 or even a piston type carburettor on a powertorque? Just curious.
Maybe t is best to just scavenge needles from wrecks seeing as G4/LMs are so numerous.

No idea how many G4/LM carbs I have here but most of them have no needles or primer caps because I'm constantly ratting them to find one that works. Too difficult to fit a G3 to the existing manifold and the G4 and LM are a fantastic carby once modified apart from the float needle. I'm always on the lookout for full crank barrels with G4/LM manifolds so I can set they up with the plastic carby. Millions of these carbs out there, needle is the only issue with them

I came across a complete steel decked full crank 160 side pull with catcher AND no rust holes in the deck last week, but couldn't undo one of the knobs to fold the handle bars so as I could bundle it into my car. The knob kept turning without unscrewing and I didn't have a vice grips handy to stop one end rotating.
I was going to get it with a ute but felt too lazy to fetch it that night but alas it was gone the morning, probably crushed by the truck's compactor. I'm just imagining the bits like the needle and primer cap I could have got off it if I couldn't have got it going.

Full crank sidepull bases are usually ok rust wise, it is the powertorque bases that seem to suffer rust big time

Based on my experience I haven't had too many that do not seat and therefore flood out the carby, much more common is that they get stuck and don't release petrol and hence the mower won't start. Have resorted to sanding the needle but if you sand too much it tends to snag in the bore because it's now too loose, can't win.

Based on my experience I would have to agree with you on this, probably 3 to 1 stick compared to flooding. I would be so much better if you could see what was going on , it is a complete guess and made worse knowing the new parts are so dodgy. It is so frustrating trying to decide if I should take a chance on getting these needles from the States.

G'day all
This topic has somewhat gone a little erratic.
The main theme seems to be G4/LM needles.

I have renamed the topic to reflect this.
I hope no one objects.

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Jack

I got an old 1970s Victa Mayfair low arch mower with 125cc that would only start for a second and then cut out. I swapped needles and it still hesitated to stay on but would at least do so after a second or third attempt, unlike before. I suspect there are other problems but it now cuts grass.

Victa obviously had a good supplier of these, not from the places this rubbish aftermarket stuff comes from. Problem is once the factory ones need replacing only option is to find another carby and hope it has a good factory one in it

They seem to come in many colours. Ones I recall are black, ivory white, bright yellow and pinkish red. Any I've missed?
Which seem to offend most often and least?

I had better results from a pack of yellow ones that Lachlan said were from a different supplier but they were only marginally better and I ended up getting a few of them to work with fingers crossed

Pretty sure I've seen orange ones as well. Not sure if any one colour outperforms any others. As Norm has suggested we may have to machine our own, only thing is they're so small.

Maybe try to polish them??

I think you can add grey to the list.

Tiger I think I could hold them in a small drill chuck in my lathe, take a shave off them to get the diameter right, then file them down to the length we need, a real pain but I don't see much alternative. I did say I try to keep this mower hobby thing cost neutral so it means I have to work hard to claw back the cost of the needles

There won't be any money in it but if we could get some specs/tolerances for needles that do work, it would save time. Then if you come across a needle you can quickly check it with digital calipers, if it doesn't meet the necessary tolerances you can discard it and move onto one that does meet the necessary specs.

Tiger I know exactly what I need/want and it must be viton tipped but anything that is out there that might do the job, cheapest I have seen is about $4 from India up to a any sort of figure you could imagine and then they still need to be modified to fit. Nothing out there anywhere that is about the same size of the Victa one

Still contemplating the next move on the needles from the States. I'm a little concerned with the diameter of the needle just below the viton tip. Does anybody know how the tip is attatched? I would assume they are pushed into the brass, I doubt they would be glued somehow.I'm looking to have to remove about 1/2mm from this end of the needle and the length of the needle. I have asked the seller if he could post me one to see if I can manage the modifications. See what comes out of that