Feedback on $50 Onan carbs on Amazon?

dedmiston wrote:
What's the consensus on the cheap knockoff carbs for Onan 5500 generators? They run in the $45 - $70 range, which is a lot less than $400 for the OEM.


Anybody here have any experience with the knockoff carbs?

A neighbour is a retired mechanic, an old school ‘rebuild not replace’ kinda guy. He was an auto mechanic who gave up on stealerships and their ‘throw parts at it’ mentality as he got on in years and went to work for the local rent-all shop that was a huge small engine / chainsaw retail & repair facility. Honda & Stihl dealers.

I took my small snowblower to him earlier this fall because it wouldn’t idle properly. I was very surprised when he suggested a replacement ’knock-off’ carb for the Kohler engine in it.

His comment was the carb is $30, a rebuild kit is $50 and there’s $0 labour in rebuild time.

I asked about quality, his opinion (based on the ones he used) was that they seemed every bit as good as the ‘factory’ items.

That was good enough for me.