Gas in crank case!!
I've seen this many times, you've got fuel system problems.
Here is how to fix this yourself.
1) Drain out all of the oil that has the fuel in it and dispose of it in an EPA friendly way.
2) Take the fuel supply line off of the carburetor and drain the fuel out of the tank into a clean plastic container. You want to get the tank as dry as possible, so tilt and shake the generator or whatever you need to in order to get everything out of the tank. Look at the stuff that drained into the container, if it looks like Italian dressing or has a layer of stuff at the bottom of the container get rid of it just like the oil.
3) Get a flashlight and look at the inside of the fuel tank. You're looking for rust, bits of debris, and anything else that may have found its way in there. A clean fuel tank is a happy fuel tank.
On some generators there is a metal shutoff valve at the bottom of the tank where the fuel line goes to the carb that has a removable "cup" at the bottom. If yours has one you should take it apart, gently clean it, and reassemble it. you don't have to remove the valve from the tank to do this.
4) Take the bowl off of the carb. The exact procedure for this will vary with the model of generator you have but the point is to find out just how much crud is in the carb causing the float to stick and let fuel get into your crankcase. Be gentle with the carb parts, it's easy to stretch the rubber bits without meaning to do so. The decision you have to make at this point is whether you're going to try and clean the original carb or just get a new one. If the carb looks badly crusted up with stuff, or if I can see obviously broken parts I go find out how expensive a replacement is, often it's less than $100US so I replace the carb to avoid charging the $100 to clean the old one.
5) If you've opted to try and clean the carb take it off of the engine, spread out a clean shop towel, and disassemble the carb as far as possible. I try to put the parts down on the towel in the order I took them off as sort of a hint as to where they came from. If you're really careful you can probably just reuse the parts of the carb, mostly the rubber and fiber gaskets get damaged in disassembly and have to be replaced. Poke a small wire thru each of the holes in the carb body, especially the tiny ones inside near the engine side of the body. I use a cut down piece of an old antilash spring for this job, you should use whatever works without making any of the holes you poke get damaged. Blow compressed air thru all of the holes in the carb, when you blow air thru the fuel inlet seat do it from the inside of the carb towards the fuel tank to avoid dislodging the valve seat if there is one.
Inspect the needle valve for signs of wear, damage, or excessive "ringing" that could make it leak.
Float the little float in a pan of water, submerge it all the way under and look for bubbles.
Once you've got everything shiny clean and nothing is broken, put it all back together. Again be careful with the orings and gaskets as they are annoyingly fragile.
6) Now that the fuel tank has had time to get dry inside, inspect it again. blow it out with compressed air, keep your face away from the fill tube when doing this to avoid debris in your eyes, WEAR EYE PROTECTION, put your hand over the fill tube with the fuel valve open and blow air between your fingers to gently pressurize the tank so you can check for big leaks, this also blows out the fuel line.
7) Put the fuel system back together starting with the carb and working back towards to fuel tank. Check the end of the fuel line for cracks before reassembling it onto the carb. If there are cracks you can someitmes trim off a bit of the fuel line. If the fuel line is at all worn consider replacing it, fuel line is usually around $2/foot so it is cheap and easy.
8) Put clean fresh oil back into the engine, remove inspect and perhaps replace the spark plug. It is way better to just replace a suspect plug than to try and clean it.Leave the air cleaner element and cover off for now.
9) Put in fresh fuel, open the fuel valve and wait 5 minutes. Look down the carb intake as see if there is fuel pouring out where it shouldn't, if there isn't check the oil and smell for fuel. If you've gotten this far with no problems reassemble the air cleaner and cover, apply half choke and try to start the engine. If it starts you're done, shut off the fuel valve and let the engine run until it starves for fuel and dies, this keeps our newly cleaned carb from getting dirty quite as fast. You might have to use full choke for a few pulls to get the engine to start the first time.
10) If the engine won't start, get some carb cleaner or brake cleaner and spray it past the carb into the intake, a one sec blast is enough. Pull the rope and see if the engine fires at all, if it does you've still got fuel systems problems and have to systematicaly check everything again, if it doesn't at least make some sort of detonation you've got some other problem to find.
Regards,
Carl
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