Small Engines (Lawn Mowers, etc.): briggs & stratton, spark plug gap, briggs stratton

Question
I put away my snowblower in the spring running. Now it won't start. There is gas but no spark. I chahnge the spark plug and cleaned the pickup magnets. I removed the coil to clean the surfaces. Still no spark. What is the air gap suppose to be for the coil? The motor is a 4 stroke 8 hp pre 1981 How do i remove the magneto, i took off the rhe recoil and there is a assembly with ball bearings in it for the recoil. This unit is in the way of putting on the magneto puller. How does this come off. Thanks Al

Answer
The spark plug gap should be 0.25.  Remove the spark plug reattach it to the spark plug wire and lay against the cylinder head turned snow for on or move the throttle to the on position and pull the rope check for spark if there is none remove the blower housing this is the hosing that the starter is attached to it will expose the flywheel follow the spark plug wire back to the ignition coil there should be to screws retaining the coil if there is something mounted in front of the coil you will have to remove that first.  When installing a new ignition coil set the distance between the flywheel the magnets and the ignition coil to the thickness of a business card.  Within engine of this age you may have breaker points and condenser under the flywheel that will have to be more than likely replaced to remove the flywheel there may be a starter clutch screwed on to the crankshaft.  The starter clutch can be removed by blocking the flywheel and grasping the clutch housing with a large channel or a special tool can be purchased from Briggs & Stratton.  With the starter clutch remove you will see where the flywheel Poehler Olds screw into the flywheel on either side of the crankshaft once the flywheel is off if there is points and condenser you will see if be sure to inspect the points plunger it is more than likely warring in a very small amount of oil gets past it and onto your points replaced the plunger the breaker points and condenser.  The other possibility would be to install a Briggs and Stratton magnetron ignition this would put electronic ignition on your engine the points plunger hole will be plugged with an aluminum plug.  This option is available for all Briggs & Stratton engines I would suggest converting your engine to electronic ignition.  This should repair your ignition issues.  If not please contact us for more assistance good luck on your project