Won't stay running

[Muldrick]

I have a Sears push mower with a 5.5 or 6hp engine.
It would only run if I continued pushing the fuel bubble or sprayed carb cleaner into the carb.
Ok, easy enough, clean the carb out should fix it, obviously a fuel restriction.

Cleaned the carb, jets, needle and seat, etc. Does the same thing!

I then replaced the carb and it STILL doe the same thing....makes no sense.
I had already replaced the fuel and filter.

Does anyone have any ideas what the problem might be?:confused2:

 

[SeniorCitizen]

First leg of the fuel's trip is from the tank to the filter. Consider checking that even though the primer says it is.

 

[platefire]

I worked on a friends Honda this week and cleaned his corroded carb. When I put the carb back on it ran a minute and died. I double checked and no gas coming out of fuel line to carb. I found the fuel filter was on backwards and once I reversed it everything was flowing like it should and staying running. Bob

 

[Muldrick]

If I pull the fuel line off the carb, fuel poors out, so there certainly seems to be no delivery problem

 

[Scrubcadet10]

could it be a cracked intake manifold/tube causing a vacuum leak?