[cwiert]

thank you for all the replies.
it did have old gas in it (about 3 years old). I drained it before starting it and put new gas in, but as i mentioned in the first post, it started right up, but only on full choke and only ran that way. When I took the carb off, I never dropped the bowl on the bottom (I tried to, but the 2 screws are on there so friggin tight, i started to strip the screws, so I just left it alone...especially since the rest of the carb looked so clean). I guess I need to revisit that and get the bowl off one way or another.
thanks again.