Harmony carb gasket question

tmf

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I've got a Harmony II SDA (HRR216SDA) with GCV160 engine. Does anyone know whether there should be a paper gasket on the side of the aircleaner housing facing the engine?
 

Scrubcadet10

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Yes!
There are a few videos on YouTube of how the gaskets go.
Be sure to be the all the small holes lined up too in the side of the gasket, if they have them.
 

tmf

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My problem was almost certainly lean surge caused by my faulty installation of an Amazon Panari carb. Your idea of finding a video was great - I found this excellent video ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92nQ1uXw8fo ) on carb gasket placement for the GCV160. Used knowledge gained there to properly install an Amazon HOOAI carb with excellent results. Mower started on the first pull and has rock steady RPM under load.
 

tmf

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I spent a lot of time on this lean surge problem on my Craftsman with Honda engiine. Did a lot of carb and gasket swapping. I had two used Honda GCV160 carbs to play around with along with an Amazon Panari carb. One observation is the choke valve on the Honda carb isn't designed to fully close. I actually prefer the Panari / HOOAI design where the butterfly valve can fully close. Honda may have been under pressure to produce a lean running carb but the aftermarket likely doesn't have the same restriction. I can tell you I have two perfect running mowers now with GCV160 engines - one running a Panari and the other running a HOOAI. I can't say for sure my cleaning of the Honda carbs did not work out because their ongoing problems could well have been faulty gasket installation. One of them had very little crud in the bowl, was soaked in carb cleaner then blown out with a compressor. I've cleaned many a carb and expected that to resolve the issues but it did not. My best friend on this fix was the attached picture that was modified for my Type 6 motors. Honda GCV160 carb gasket layout.jpg
 
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