Ok I was able to properly adjust the valves tonight. They were both a little too tight, but not too bad.
Put it back together, fired it up, zero change.
I'm really running out of ideas. I guess theres that keyway thing people have mentioned. Although this machine is so new, I doubt that would be it, but I'm running out of ideas fast. So about the flywheel key, if the key was broken, wouldn't the flywheel essentially just spin randomly?As opposed to being off a few degrees? I'll have to take it off later this week and see if I can see anything.
For now, it is running much better with the original carb than it did with the ebay carb. So I'll probably just start mowing my lawn with it again while I try to figure it out and maybe it just magically gets better
Here's video of it running tonight, post-valve adjust. The mic on my phone doesn't pick up the skipping very well, so its not running as smooth as it sounds here. And even so, you can still hear misfiring if you listen close. Also the choke is open but I had warmed up the machine before I took this video. I don't know if it was open at that point or if it is operating normally. But a stuck open choke would only affect a cold engine wouldn't it? Once it's warmed up, it should run totally normal?