I think it's a shame so many people are making fun of this poor juliez. Not everyone has the good fortune to learn engines and stuff. At least give them credit for mowing their own grass. That being said, has it occurred to anyone that the spark plug might be covered by a plastic cowling? I was at Home Depot today to get parts for my powerwasher, which also uses the Honda GCV160. And I happened to notice in passing that the mowers using that engine do, in fact, have a big plastic cowling around the engine. For an inexperienced person who does not understand the basics of engines, it would be easy to not be able to find where the spark plug is. Out of sight, out of mine! My advice, if you're still looking for it, is to unscrew the plastic covering on the engine. At the front, you will see a little white cylinder sticking out. The spark plug wire pops on top of that. As others have said, you may need to change the spark plug. That is as simple as getting a spark plug wrench, which is a little $5 device that looks like a penny roller that you stick on top of the spark plug and turn to remove it. Remember, righty-tightie, lefty-loosie.

Why not go back to Menards? I saw one of these on an old eBay listing and the seller said he bought it last year. One would think that Menards was likely his source for it as it's not unusual for such items to be private branded items. I Googled it to see if something else came up but no luck.

*SIGH*... Y'know mownie, I really do think that the hard-to-turn-the-engine-over syndrome is related to the starter. Now I can't get it to turn the engine more than a single revolution at all even when it is cold (I have it uncovered so I can see what it is doing when cranking it), let alone turn it over to fire. This is what it was doing when it was hot. So can't try out the carb adjustments yet since I can't get it to turn the flywheel fast enough to fire the engine at all. What HAS been happening is when you turn the ignition key, the starter driveshaft pops up, the gear engages the flywheel, then it stops wmmph at a high compression point in the engine or something, and then labors and can't turn it past that point, like something is jamming up somewhere. At least once tonight though it cranked the engine a couple revolutions without incident but it wasn't seeming to get any firing action; that was right after I put the battery on the charger briefly. THEN, after that a couple times the starter drive shaft (or whatever it is) did not pop up at all upon turning the key; it sat there and spinned....so we know it is getting current. Tried a little WD-40 to the shaft under the silver disk-shaped part below the gear but did not make much difference...a and finally another time the shaft popped up, engaged, stopped (when it stops it is engaged with the flywheel and stays there after releasing the key; you have to turn the shaft to make it come back down), and then there were a couple of clicking noises coming from inside the starter too when the key was held in start briefly past the jam-up point. That also happened on one or two tries. Sooooo....Battery? Starter? Neither? Both? lol. I replaced a broken plastic part at the top of the drive shaft on the starter season before last; will have to look up what it is called but remember removing and replacing the pin that holds it all together to the drive shaft was next to impossible...so kind of hesitant to try to tear it all down again because it was such a pain. Way easier to just buy a new one, albeit a lot pricier.. Might make more sense just to put the battery on the charger to be sure it does have sufficient charge before blowing $125 on a new starter but will it hurt the battery if it DOESN'T need charging to do this? Can't afford the starter at this point anyway. Sorry to change this thread so late in the game, if you think I need to start another let me know. Dang dinosaur...it just doesn't want to do any work, that's all... :^\

If your still having problems with it now, you should take it back to Home Depot. I think I would have taken it back the first day. I hope you registered a warranty. If not sorry. Wish I could of made it to this thread a little bit earlier to through some advice about these generators, and how much of a pain they can be. Here's some advice to the newbies. If your thinking about getting a portable generator, go check out the Yamaha brand. They're the most reliable dealer of generators on the market. The only one that even comes close is the Honda, but Yamaha very well outweighs. It's features doesn't compare to other brands, and the price is always affordable. More info on Yamaha generators here. Here is a link that might be useful: Yamaha Generators