Small Engines (Lawn Mowers, etc.): B&S Engine not starting, briggs straton, john c bridges

Question
HI Jeff,
I have a Troy bilt lawn mover with B&s engine(Details given below) that is not starting now. It was starting and stopping  earlier, so I was asked by John.C.Bridges to clean up the carburetor and rebuild it. After rebuilding it, gas started leaking from the carburettor. I was told to reseat the needle as that may be causing the leak. so I fixed that and it is not leaking gas any more.

what else do I need to check to see everything is fine.

Is it possible that the spark plug has gone bad? but I was able to get the mover to start for a brief moment before i rebuilt the carburettor.

How do you test the spark plug anyway? Can you please help me figure it out.

thanks,

Lawn Mover: TRoy Bilt
Model No: 12AV839N711

Engine: Briggs & Straton
Model - 127602
Type  - 0370-E1
Code  - 040927FD

thanks,

srinivas

Answer
John is good.  now lets back up,  it started and ran, but quit?? had you tried to resart it then? before redoing carb.??  it may not have needed that, but i,m not sure i haven gotten the whole story . so lets back up... you now have the carb. cleaned. and reseated the needle seat. have you adjusted the float> turning carb, up side down, i like to set my floats with just a little upslope of the float from needle.you do this by bending the float tab at needle lightly.  if you are getting fuel after you put back on engine, and everything is fine there, lets check for spark at plug. we have testers, but you may not. so  take out plug,  hook up wire, ground plug body to the engine. not the electrode , but the plug housing.  plug over a few times and see if you have fire at the plug. if you do,  then it should fire up .  you may have to choke hard, but should fire up. Also  have you adjusted the carb.?  1 and 1/2 turns out from bottom  is a good start, and tweak after running. you can do this on both air and fuel  mixture needles..  idle screw as needed.   if you have no spark at plug>>>>  try a new one....  now heres where i  want to tell you, if you done all this and still have no spark???? check to make sure cut off switches, wires, etc. are not grounded out... if thats okay, your coil under flywheel may have gone south> quit!!  thus needing replacement.   give this all a try okay ,  let me know how this all turns out.