129 Issues

[SuzukiT350man]

A couple years ago I dragged my Dad’s 129 he bought for $40 out of his junk pile and had no compression. I’m absolutely sure the tractor was parked because one hydro release valve was stuck closed and it was obvious some knucklehead hammered it in, who knows why. The exhaust valve was stuck open probably from sitting, no signs of a burnt valve or overheating and a few hits from the butt end of a hammer solved that problem.

I believe it has the Carter carb and it was more gummed up than anything I'd worked on before. I took apart and cleaned the carb, but the throttle butterfly was still stuck closed and I broke all the brass screws on the butterflies, I had no idea at the time that they were hammered in to prevent them from backing out. I’d have to sell one of my kidneys to get a Walbro carb so the Chinese knockoff would have to do. I put it on my working 129 (has a k241 swap) and it worked alright. Just to be on the safe side I ordered points and a condenser from ISaveTractors.com and tested those on my working 129 and they work great. As for the hydro release valves go, I stole a pair off a 169 that were in good condition. Adjusted the valves to factory spec. New head gasket, valve cover gasket, points cover gasket, gas tank cleaned and new fuel line and filter.

After all that, it idled perfectly, but once you give it throttle, it sputtered and wouldn’t move under its own power, only at idle. I even took the carb and ignition coil off my good one and it didn’t care how much you adjusted the carb, it just won’t go higher RPM's.

My Dad and I watched a Youtube video on how to set the ignition timing and did exactly as the guy said in the video and still ran like crap. I’d like to get it back to working condition, any advice or critiquing will be greatly appreciated