Starting Issues With Cub Cadet XT1
 

My Cub Cadet is about four years old and has only about 6-8 hours on it. It has always been hard to start each spring for the first time but once I get it going and im using it, it is much better. But this year it has been almost impossible to start. I tried about a month ago and after two days of trying I gave up and then a few days ago I tried again. In the morning, no go and I ran the battery down so I put it on the charger. Came back in the afternoon and after maybe the 3rd time it fired up. I let it sit there on idle for a few minutes and then I took it for a short spin. It was fine until I stepped on the gas a bit and it died and would not start again. So I removed the hood because I thought maybe the choke needed adjustment and was not going full. I think the choke is adjusted ok but not really sure. There are a couple of levers on the carb that I would try and move as I leaned over and turned the key. In my photo they are labeled A and B. A did not help but when I moved B back and forth it started and sounded good. The throttle was full. I let it run for about 2 minutes and as soon as I lowered the throttle down to a lower idle, it would die out on me and not start again until i reached over and moved the B lever I marked in my photo up and down. Next time it started I took a video of me moving the throttle from a full idle to a full choke and I thought it was odd that when running and moving the throttle to choke it had no effect at all on the engine running. I thought it would make it cut out or maybe even kill the engine but it really did not nothing. So I will post the image of the lever I labeled B and a link to my youtube video of it running and the no response to the choke. Any idea of what is going on? Thanks for any help.

https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared...hwfk7J6P7OUSc4

And here is the video:

https://youtube.com/shorts/XgZMjs3vZJE?feature=share

I hope those work. Thanks again.

Put aside the choke and the throttle for a moment...

How old is the fuel? 6-8 hours on a 4 year old tractor? I imagine you never drained the carburetor before putting it away?? Dried up and stale fuel leads to problems.

Look up under the dash at the throttle, hard to see with the gas tank, the cable may have come loose from the lever bracket. The cable is just pinched in the bracket and can be put back in but the gas tank has to come out.

It has a couple of gallons in it. About half of that is a bit old. Probably well over a year. And nope, didn't drain it at all.

I will give that a check tomorrow. Thanks.

Welcome!

The first thing I would do is dump the fuel, put a little bit of fresh fuel in, check/clean the air filter (best I could) then try again but I would be surprised if that solved it. If not, time for a new spark plug and try again. Still no joy? Chances are the carburetor needs to be taken apart and cleaned thoroughly as when fuel sits inside long enough to dry it will block ports and orifices, some of which are tiny, so tiny that only a fine guitar string will fit!
You can soak metal bits in white vinegar for short periods of time to clean them, 15-20 minutes is my limit! I then rinse with water to remove all traces of vinegar then spray with carb or brake cleaner quickly. I personally use non chlorinated brake cleaner most of the time and with the spray straw and my safety goggles on I spray in short bursts through the ports of the carburetor body itself (while it's disassembled).

Lever B in your photo looks to be the governor arm, did you feel it pushing back? By playing with it you basically bypassed all the controls, just be careful to not push it too far or you can over rev the engine.

It sounds like you have "auto choke" which probably has a weak spring on it by design (maybe the hook thing to the right of the A symbol before the linkage rod going up) and why the motor didn't respond to choke when it was running. The air being drawn in through the carburetor will overcome the spring to keep it open so you can't accidentally choke it at full throttle. I've had machines I've had to choke to turn off and the motors get really carboned up and sooty inside from doing so all the time.

Once you get it sorted out I would suggest running it more often (every couple of weeks) to keep everything inside clean and clear and or don't keep your fuel tank too full so you're circulating more fresh fuel through it.

I'm sure you'll get it sorted out sooner rather than later and have a learned a valuable lesson, it gets grumpy if you don't give it enough attention! Lol

Best of luck!

Thanks. Yes I do think that is the governor and i am careful with it. Yesterday I let it idle for quite some time and then it was the first time i have been able to let it idle in the turtle position. Before it would die on me. Then I round it around quite a bit and was able to move the throttle back and forth without dying on me. But then when i killed the engine it would not start up again from the using the throttle controls. What I am going to try first is remove the gas and then add new gas that is mixed with a treatment called Stabil that will keep the gas fresh and clean the carb at the same time. I know these new engines should probably use ethanol free fuel and the nearest station that has it is 75 miles to Stabil is supposed to take care of that. Every time I run it, it seems to get better. If no go then I will surely try your suggestions.

I was wrong about the hours. The guage says 39 hours but it did sit for almost 2 years due to me hurting my back and being a bit laid up. I got kind of lazy. Wont do that again.

If you can get your hands on Seafoam gas treatment grab it and give the (new) fuel a concentrated dose (20-25%), it's a detergent and will help clean the carburetor but it wouldn't run it in my fuel all the time.

About Stabil and other fuel stabilizers, they do KIND of work, they USED to work really well but the problem with today's fuel is that it's oxygenated and the whole point of Stabil is to float on top of the fuel to keep air out so I'm sure you can see why I say it KIND of works now...

Glad you are making progress though, please keep us updated!

I agree. In the video, he is moving the throttle all over the place and has no effect on engine speed.
Sea Foam ain't gonna fix that.

I've never found sea foam to "fix" anything.