1816B stalls in drive

[Kansas66]

Hello all, Ive searched around, but only found people with the same issue. I just recently purchased an 1816B. Every time I try to move the unit around, it eventually stalls out the engine, and kills it. Unless I grab the lever and release the drive pumps. The unit operates the bucket fine, and will do ok sitting still with the drive engaged, but as soon as I start trying to move about it eventually stalls. I was told it was flooding over, and causing the issue, but I gave the needle and seat on the carb a cleaning. It also has had an electric pump stuck on it, but I don't know the psi its operating it. The engine idles and does fine throughout everything, except when trying to move. though it does seem flooded when I try to start it up after drying, but unsure if that is just loaded up from being bogged down, and dying. I feel like something in the hydraulic system is loading up and dragging it down, but unsure. It has new oil, and a good filter. Any tips would be appreciated. It seems other people have had the issue, so guessing something on the slightly common side, just haven't found answers. Thank you.

 

[SkidRoe]

Are you sure that the float height is correct? Could it be too low?
Maybe also try adjusting the high speed mixture screw, assuming it has one.
Just a couple of guesses - SR

 

[Kansas66]

Are you sure that the float height is correct? Could it be too low?
Maybe also try adjusting the high speed mixture screw, assuming it has one.
Just a couple of guesses - SR

Thank you for the reply, I really appreciate it. Thought you might be onto something with the float too low, so I went out to work on it, and think I may have stumbled on the issue through elimination. The engine seemed to be running on both cylinders, but I don't have a lot of experience with Onan's to be able to audibly notice something wrong. I pulled one spark plug wire, and the engine wouldn't start with the remaining cylinder. So I reversed the procedure, and it started. I thought maybe it was a bad plug, so I swapped the plugs. The problem didn't follow the plug. Pulling the wire on the weak cylinder while it is running makes an audible difference, almost seems like something is going on in there, but whatever it is its really weak. Guess m going to have to be tearing into the engine to see if its valve adjustment related or just doing a repower with a 22hp Predator or something. Sorry the formatting on this is hard to read, not sure how to insert breaks.

 

[flyerdan]

Thank you for the reply, I really appreciate it. Thought you might be onto something with the float too low, so I went out to work on it, and think I may have stumbled on the issue through elimination. The engine seemed to be running on both cylinders, but I don't have a lot of experience with Onan's to be able to audibly notice something wrong. I pulled one spark plug wire, and the engine wouldn't start with the remaining cylinder. So I reversed the procedure, and it started. I thought maybe it was a bad plug, so I swapped the plugs. The problem didn't follow the plug. Pulling the wire on the weak cylinder while it is running makes an audible difference, almost seems like something is going on in there, but whatever it is its really weak. Guess m going to have to be tearing into the engine to see if its valve adjustment related or just doing a repower with a 22hp Predator or something. Sorry the formatting on this is hard to read, not sure how to insert breaks.

Before you start tearing into the engine, go through the ignition system first. Since the weak cylinder is firing, as noted by the tone change when pulling the wire, check that the wire is putting out full power, either with a DMM or swapping sides. Does the plug look slightly more fouled, or is it caked up and oily?
If the wire (or coil side) is weak, it could fire the plug, but not with enough energy to start or run on standalone.
If the plug is oily and crudded up, that indicates a cylinder problem.

 

[Kansas66]

Before you start tearing into the engine, go through the ignition system first. Since the weak cylinder is firing, as noted by the tone change when pulling the wire, check that the wire is putting out full power, either with a DMM or swapping sides. Does the plug look slightly more fouled, or is it caked up and oily?
If the wire (or coil side) is weak, it could fire the plug, but not with enough energy to start or run on standalone.
If the plug is oily and crudded up, that indicates a cylinder problem.

Poked around, flipped wires, etc. I just bought this thing at an auction the other day, and it wouldn't load itself onto the trailer when I went to pack up. In the middle of fighting with it the carb was sputtering fuel, I should have known better, because it didn't look to be flooding over to me, really. I'm 80 miles from my tools, but decided to just stick my thumb over the spark plug hole to at least see if I was getting any compression....none. The "flooding" was a leaky intake valve blowing back. Think I'm just going to relap the valves and see how it goes. Surprisingly the actual running cylinder has some fairly serious rust pitting. Probably leaked in the nicely designed water funnel air filter lid. After learning about these engines, I might just pull it back out this winter, to be bored out, with new pistons.

 

[LittleMontana]

Poked around, flipped wires, etc. I just bought this thing at an auction the other day, and it wouldn't load itself onto the trailer when I went to pack up. In the middle of fighting with it the carb was sputtering fuel, I should have known better, because it didn't look to be flooding over to me, really. I'm 80 miles from my tools, but decided to just stick my thumb over the spark plug hole to at least see if I was getting any compression....none. The "flooding" was a leaky intake valve blowing back. Think I'm just going to relap the valves and see how it goes. Surprisingly the actual running cylinder has some fairly serious rust pitting. Probably leaked in the nicely designed water funnel air filter lid. After learning about these engines, I might just pull it back out this winter, to be bored out, with new pistons.

I know this is a little late, but I just ran into this problem as well. After new carb, new plugs, new wires, carburator, fuel pump, and changing to dual exhaust. I found one side running very cold. Scoped the cylinder and noticed that the intake valve looked funny(sharp edge on seat). Tore it down and it turns out the valve seat had gotten loose. Apparently Onans are notorious for this. It after a full year down it appeared that someone has tried to fix it by adding shims to the valve spring and removing all of the lash. It ended up just pulling the seat almost all the way through the block. Engine seems to have gotten so unbalanced the a crack appeared in the lower part of the block. Well all said and done, new Honda coming on Monday. Best of luck with yours. LM