I have not had real good luck with my engines lately. I have a used DLE 55 engine in an SBach that I just recently refurbished. I put the engine on a canister and added a venturi to solve an issue of oil and gas misting into the engine box while running. All had been well until the last couple trips out. It developed a problem of flooding on the second start of the outing. First start up and flight, all fine. Go to start a second time and it would flood. Pull the plug. Plug full of gas. Clear it out. Try to start without choke. Still flooded. This happened again yesterday and I decided I had enough. Pulled the carb this AM and put a rebuild kit in. After the rebuild, it runs great. The flooding doesn’t appear to be an issue from what I can tell. But during runs to tweak the needles, I discovered a high idle issue. No matter what, I get 1800-1900. Even with the throttle completely closed or very close to closed, it runs at this RPM. What would cause that? My guess is some type of air leak somewhere. But I’m all for input here. When I first started running this engine, as I recall, I could kill it with trim by closing the throttle. But not now.

Thanks for the help/input.

JAM

It's getting air from somewhere... leaks between the carb, reed, reed block, or block spacer to engine..

Take the cowl off, and run the engine. Take brake cleaner and mist your gaskets, 1 by 1, but dont flood the area. Just a small squirt works. If your sucking air, and mist the gaskets and you find a leak, the engine will want to load up and die.

Oooooookay. I think I know what it is. I remember now when I was dealing with the fuel mist issue, the reed block gaskets tore when I took everything apart for inspection. I traced and cut my own. It’s run so good up to now, I never gave it a second thought. But I just bet one or more of my gaskets isn’t up to the task. I’ve got an official gasket kit coming and I’ll see what that does. Thanks guys.

JAM

Yeah, it was my gaskets. Even though Tower Hobbies sent me the wrong gasket set (sent me the 55RA set, even though I ordered the correct set), it all worked great. Got my idle back and I can certainly kill it with the trim.