Well I called Tony over at ECCarburetors and I can get a stock carb for 184+ shipping or I can get a stock carb from Al Hodge at Peformance V-twin for 234+ shipping, but he will Mod the bowl and rectifier for free. They just use a large main and the needle obstructs it. Some you can convert, you can buy a main needle for a clone carb but the vanguard lays on the engine not sure you can with those.as the needle usually goes up the bowl right where the main jet is, and into the jet. The earlier engines used carbs with adjustable main jets, but not sure any vanguards did. You can get a lot of performance parts for vanguards, sometimes you can use parts off the larger ones it depends. There should be some threads here in the BB section on jetting them, most of the B&S is in big block. However, I hate replacing stock parts with stock parts. I just need to find a used one from some one who upgraded their Carb. Thanks for all the information! Ill look up modding that carb just for my own knowledge, but it looks like getting the earlier style carb would be the safe bet. Could be there are posts here on jetting them too lot of carts run them. NR racing might have some stuff but the gokart places tend to stick with smaller engines. If you look that stuff up you can find engine places that work with them. They use these engines in lawn mower racing and pulling, also some kids drag racing and some midget circle track racing, and out in AZ they run some strange buggies in the desert with them. They are pretty crude, they just can't stay in perfect tune for long but I don't see too many EFI lawn engines. I can't swear here but you see what is going on. And if they get a little wear on them or something and run poorly, all you can do is buy an entire new carb. Most of these small engines run the best a little rich, but the EPA is not going to have that. There are also air jets you can mod but is more complex and I'm not familiar with that carb. I'd guess the idle is lean, if that does not work the main is a little lean. If it has an emulsion tube in the carb sometimes that can affect it as it acts like an accelerator pump sort of, you might find an aftermarket one or mod the holes in it, but be sure you know what you are doing. If you go a little larger you might gain a little more power at higher rpm too large it will kill bottom torque. You can replace the carb with something you can work with, like a mikuni or other motorcycle type carb that you can jet. If you take the stock airbox and muffler off and put high flow on.you have to jet them much richer to run right and sometimes other carb mods. For a bandaid you can limit the air intake somehow like more air filter material/etc.
You can look up how to mod that carb, some you can put larger jets in and/or mixture screws if you drill out the caps or whatever they used.
Im not really wanting to sink a bunch of money on this engine because I plan on buying a 35hp Vanguard surface drive mud motor in the future, but until then I want this engine to run right! Its very annoying to have the thing cut off when you trying to cruise slowly in certain areas and bog when you go to hit the gas in muddy areas or just out in open water. With that being said am I limited to how low I can set my idle before this bog will start happening? What can I do to correct this?
From my reading/searching on this forum I have found out that I have the Carb that does not have the 'idle mixture screw'. The engine will do this if there is a load or if there isn't a load, it doesnt matter. Also this is with the choke in the "off" postion. Now, if I raise the Idle above 1500RPMs (no load) the bogging will stop almost completely and the engine will Rev out as it should. However, if I push the choke into the "on" position it will Rev out just fine. OK, with that being said the problems that Im having is that when my idle is set at 1200-1280RRMs (no load) and I hit the throttle from idle the engine will bog down to the point of cutting off. I guess I should first state that this isnt in a golf cart but instead is the engine for my longtail mud motor. Im having some issues with my new 23hp Vanguard which has just over 10 hours on it.