Mine has great reliability and stump pulling torque. I bought it used, and the seller said it had about 2 gallons in it. With any 2 stroke glow engine, they will run over a fairly wide range of needle settings. Essentially, as long as there is enough fuel in the mix to burn at all and the glow plug stays lit, they will keep running. Mysterious dead sticks in the air are more often fuel tank or line problems or either air leaks in the engine.