My Mantis tiller is about 7 years old and has always started like a charm, never giving me a moments trouble. The last few times it has been difficult to start, not wanting to fire, but it ran well once it started. I fiddled with the cap on the spark plug, pulled it off and put it back on a couple of times and it finally fired allowing me to start it. That may or may not have been the problem for it's not wanting to fire. I've always let it idle for it's warm up and cool down before cutting it off. Now nothing when I went to start it today after these few uses of difficult starts. I changed the spark plug, cleaned the air filter, checked the fuel filter and fuel lines this morning. I've traced all of the wiring that I can see and that looks fine (but some is hidden). I noticed that the old spark plug had lots of black goo on it, but it is old. The new plug, which I have taken out a couple of times in frustration is showing a blackish oily film on it. Is that normal? Just in case it was flooded from my all of my attempts at starting it I went through the procedure in the manual for starting a flooded engine (though I don't think I actually flooded it. I've started and used this thing many, many hours every season as my main tiller for vegetable gardening. That didn't help either. It still wouldn't fire. After going through the procedure for a flooded engine the rope would no longer pull normal as it should (it pulled freely before and during the procedure - pulling the rope without the plug in). HELP! Please use layman terms because I am new to working on this. I have no one around to work on this for me and really can't afford to take it to the shop.
Jenny from Virginia

Garden - Mantis - 2-Cycle Tiller