Anyone any good with petrol generators

Beerboy · 2 Mar 2010, 1:12 pm

I have bought one of those crappy hurricane 2 stroke generators off ebay. Its was still in the box and not been run for a while. I have filled with gas and can smell petrol at the spark plug but cannot get a spark. Pretty well stumped as there is no decent documentation and I have no idea if it has a battery or coil pack. any one any ideas apart from put it back on ebay 😂

waveman1500 · 2 Mar 2010, 5:30 pm

It will have a coil/magneto thing next to the flywheel somewhere, check that it's all okay. Is it switched on? Tried a new plug? Cheap two-stroke engines can be very hard to start sometimes, but a new or cleaned, dry plug usually helps.

Beerboy · 2 Mar 2010, 5:36 pm

yes turned on and turns over pretty well, just will not fire. plug looks brand new but probably not a bad place to start.

should it have a battery?

greedy53 · 2 Mar 2010, 5:38 pm

as above and also remove the plug and earth it on the head or any where you can earth it than give it a tug and see if there is spark

Beerboy · 2 Mar 2010, 5:40 pm

greedy53 wrote:as above and also remove the plug and earth it on the head or any where you can earth it than give it a tug and see if there is spark

thats what I tried to come to the conclusion no spark

could smell petrol with plug out

donn · 3 Mar 2010, 6:51 am

I had the same problem with my sons small GMC generator, ended up bypasing the small rocker switch that turns the motor off, turned out that it wasn't doing its job and was permanantly turned off.

Beerboy · 3 Mar 2010, 8:15 am

donn wrote:I had the same problem with my sons small GMC generator, ended up bypasing the small rocker switch that turns the motor off, turned out that it wasn't doing its job and was permanantly turned off.

that sounds like a good place to start mate as everything else looks like new, and is silly enough to be the reason.

will give it a go tonight

waveman1500 · 3 Mar 2010, 9:32 am

Remember that an open circuit = ignition on though! If you just solder the two pieces of wire together you will never get it going!

Beerboy · 3 Mar 2010, 11:12 am

now I am confused, so I need to put a replacement switch in there

68AutoBug · 3 Mar 2010, 12:47 pm

Beerboy wrote:now I am confused, so I need to put a replacement switch in there

Yes

to turn the engine OFF....

LEE

Beerboy · 3 Mar 2010, 3:01 pm

ok great thanks. makes sense :-)

Beerboy · 3 Mar 2010, 7:23 pm

thanks donn I swapped out the switch and it started put the old switch back in and it started so must have been a dodgy connection. thanks for that I am well pleased. didn't want another large brick

donn · 4 Mar 2010, 6:46 pm

cool that it worked for you, I fixed my problem by simply doing away with the swith altogether, just touched the wires to stop it