I wanted to share something in case others have a similar issue. I was running my FG60 yesterday, preparing for an upcoming flyin, and really had the engine running good. I cut the engine off to go get a drink of water and when I came back out to start the engine, I started it and noticed it was running rough. It looked like I was near out of gas so I filled it back up. After that, all it would do was crank up and shut back down. After checking battery voltage, spark plug wires, etc, I figured this was a fuel issue. I pulled the engine off the plane so I could take a look at the carb. I found that I could not blow through the fuel inlet cleanly. It felt restricted so I began to tear the carb apart. After taking the pump and associated components apart, I blew everything out with compressed air. I put it back together but left the throttle barrel of so I could look at it. As I looked towards the high speed needle, I could see that the brass tube looked clogged. It looked so smooth on the end that I was wondering if it was suppose to be like that. I couldn’t see it working like that so I unscrewed the high speed needle and set it aside. I took a flash light and looked through the brass tube but could not see out the other end. I took a small wire and ran through the high speed needle body and began to push out what looked to be crud. I sat this on a paper towel and blew the opening out with air. Now the light would shine all the way through. I assembled everything back together and now ready to try and run the engine. I’m sure this is why it wouldn’t start and run.

I took a magnet and ran it across the paper towel where the crud was and low and behold the magnet sucked it off the paper towel. I still don’t know what it was but it had a green tint to it under the magnifying glass. All I can think of is that something got sucked into the carb while running it on my driveway without the cowl installed. Definitely something to check if you are running good and all of a suddden loose gas flow to the carb. I use roto flow tanks and I’m wondering if somehow a piece of solder from inside the tank made it past my filtration. Sure is strange. I haven’t tried to crank the motor as it got late last night but I’m sure this was the problem, I’ll report back after I try to run it again.

Debris in the bore of the high speed needle can’t be good, it was completely stopped up.