I have a very similar problem. Mine idles and runs kinda ok until I put the air filter on. Then it smokes and chokes. I went down the same road, carb, filter, fuel pump, head gasket and even put a set of rings in. No help. Mine is a Kohler command 25 hp cv739. Anyone have any suggestions?
Without putting my hands on it, it sounds like a few things. How do the plugs look; fuel wet, chalky, carboned or oil soaked? Those can send you in a direction. If you went the economical route on the fuel system parts, something could be bad. It's just an understood risk with those that they don't hold up and are often bad out of the box. Are the linkages adjusted properly? It's easy to get stuff out of place on reassembly. Have you done a compression test?
I have a very similar problem. Mine idles and runs kinda ok until I put the air filter on. Then it smokes and chokes. I went down the same road, carb, filter, fuel pump, head gasket and even put a set of rings in. No help. Mine is a Kohler command 25 hp cv739. Anyone have any suggestions?
Without putting my hands on it, it sounds like a few things. How do the plugs look; fuel wet, chalky, carboned or oil soaked? Those can send you in a direction. If you went the economical route on the fuel system parts, something could be bad. It's just an understood risk with those that they don't hold up and are often bad out of the box. Are the linkages adjusted properly? It's easy to get stuff out of place on reassembly. Have you done a compression test?