May 2021

The week of May 9th we had our first campout of the year with the Carri-Yals club. It was held at Whittington Woods campground at Rend Lake. It was a little chilly all week long but luckily we had an activity room we could use to have our meals in. The cooler weather made for great campfires.  Here is a picture of the group after touring the Information Center at Rend Lake. Celina is missing because she left early to attend her grandson's graduation in Oklahoma.

Getting back home I got to work again on the carburetor issue with the generator in Marge. I have dumped several bottles of carburetor cleaner in it over the last two months with no improvement in performance. It starts and runs fine but surges whenever the load is changed. I had a local mechanic look at it and he determined that it definitely is a carburetor issue. (Thank you ethanol.) 

The generator is out of a 1985 motorhome so getting parts is a real problem. There have been several different carburetors used over the years on this size generator. After much searching on the internet, and studying the carburetor while on the generator, I finally found "Walbro" stamped on the carburetor and contacted that company. They said that that carburetor hasn't been made for 35 years. I would need to send them the number stamped on the carburetor flange to determine a rebuild kit. They didn't have any kits anymore but could tell me what kit to order if I could find one on the internet. They told me where to find the carburetor number. I couldn't see the number anywhere so I had to pull the carburetor off to find the number.  Here is a picture of the carburetor. The number I needed was stamped on the very bottom edge.

I emailed the carburetor number to Walbro and they told me the kit I needed. Luckily I found one on the internet and ordered it immediately because they only had two kits left. I received the kit in a few days and I am now waiting for the mechanic to pick the carburetor and kit up for rebuilding. The carburetor will need to be boiled out then rebuilt. I'm hoping he can get started on it this week sometime because we will be leaving for two weeks to go fishing in Minnesota.

Grandson Kellen graduates eight grade on Friday in California and on Saturday he will fly into St. Louis to go with us to Minnesota. We will pick him up at the airport and head north. It will be great fun. Big fish pictures to follow!