Hey all, just found out that the carb is most likely OK. The likely cause now is a leak somewhere around the crankcase and jug. Looks like some of the gasket material fell out, causing the engine to have almost no compression.

This would explain why it ran fine for me and degraded over time till now. Also, if the engine happened to get enough fuel in it, the gap would open and close during the vibration, making it run very rough and also very intermittently.

We'll know more after tonight as he is going to put the carb off of this 41 and put it on another tried and true 41 and see what difference it makes.