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I'm working on the carburetor of my Courage 21. When I go to put it all back together and slide the plastic air cleaner base onto the mounting bolts, the bolt on the right pushes into the engine housing. It's also now somehow shorter in length compared to the bolt on the left, so even if I get the bolt on the right to not move, there is not enough of the bolt sticking out the hole in the air cleaner base for me to attach the nut!

I've taken the carb apart a few times over the past few days and the mounting bolt has been solid and not moving until today. It's like something has broken off on the inside and it's no longer attached to the housing internally. At first I figured it was a screw-in type until I tried to rotate it and it just spins and doesn't get longer or shorter.

When I look at the schematic, it appears the mounting bolt on the left is a screw-in, adjustable type. But the one on the right has me scratching my head.

Again, the bolt moving into the engine housing (or whatever it's attached to) is problem enough, but it's now also shorter than the other bolt. Like it's not fully extended.

The bolt on the right is a square head carriage bolt style that sits in a recess area at the back of the plastic carb backing plate. Try pulling out on that bolt while rotating it and it should go back into place. Then may need to find a way to hold it there while the carb is installed.

Ok, that makes sense looking at the diagram of the parts. As I would rotate it while pulling it, I could feel it drop into what must be a square hole. However, the square end of the bolt must not be completely going into the hole because the bolt only comes toward me a millimeter or so and never feels fully engaged.

I'll try pulling much harder with a pair of vice grips on the non-threaded part of the mounting bolt and see if I can get to seat into the square hole more completely. I wish there was some way I could put a finger (or hammer!) on the inside end of the bolt, but there doesn't appear to be a way to access it easily.

This seems like it shouldn't be this difficult. And why use a carriage bolt instead of a double-threaded bolt like the other one? Scratching my head again...

Anyway, I'll tackle this again after work and see how it goes. Thanks, @ILENGINE!

frett said:

Ok, that makes sense looking at the diagram of the parts. As I would rotate it while pulling it, I could feel it drop into what must be a square hole. However, the square end of the bolt must not be completely going into the hole because the bolt only comes toward me a millimeter or so and never feels fully engaged.

I'll try pulling much harder with a pair of vice grips on the non-threaded part of the mounting bolt and see if I can get to seat into the square hole more completely. I wish there was some way I could put a finger (or hammer!) on the inside end of the bolt, but there doesn't appear to be a way to access it easily.

This seems like it shouldn't be this difficult. And why use a carriage bolt instead of a double-threaded bolt like the other one? Scratching my head again...

Anyway, I'll tackle this again after work and see how it goes. Thanks, @ILENGINE!

Click to expand...

The Kohler Courage is a dog of an engine. The carburetor mounting bolt design is yet one more thing that is poorly thought out. I remember the first few times having the bolts not being right when working on the carburetor on this engine. The Courage is the only model for Kohler that stinks, especially the single cylinder.

@frett If you look to the right side of that plastic carb mounting plate there is a single bolt that may have the ground wire for the fuel solenoid connected to it. If you remove it the carb isolator plate comes off and you can then access the back side of that loose bolt to reinstall it.

Besides there usually a an insert behind the insulator that needs replacing due to excessive wear. Note some styles had this piece as part of the insulator and was not a problem but Kohler went with the two piece design later.

Also if the carriage bolt is coming out of place usually the gasket is bad as it is what holds the bolt in place for installation.

ILENGINE said:

@frett If you look to the right side of that plastic carb mounting plate there is a single bolt that may have the ground wire for the fuel solenoid connected to it. If you remove it the carb isolator plate comes off and you can then access the back side of that loose bolt to reinstall it.

Click to expand...

Everything is exactly as you said. I removed the ground wire bolt and plastic plate. The mounting bolt in question was not seating into the square hole because some rubbery material (from a gasket?) was jamming it up. After I removed the debris, the bolt seated completely, and I was able to reassemble it all and get the length needed to screw the nut on.

It's running like a champ again. Thank you for your help @ILENGINE!!

StarTech said:

Besides there usually a an insert behind the insulator that needs replacing due to excessive wear. Note some styles had this piece as part of the insulator and was not a problem but Kohler went with the two piece design later.

Also if the carriage bolt is coming out of place usually the gasket is bad as it is what holds the bolt in place for installation.

Click to expand...

Yeah, you could tell the material had torn, and that's why the bolt was able to be pushed inward. However, the bulk of the gasket remained intact and apparently sealed well enough to allow the engine to run smoothly.

We'll see how it holds up! Thanks for the input, @StarTech.