| What it’s doing | Where to start | What to suspect first | Typical bracket |
|---|---|---|---|
| Won’t start at all | Lawn mower won’t start | Fuel or ignition, on a machine that sat | $105–$256 |
| Won’t start, or the auger won’t turn | Snowblower won’t start | Fuel, spark, or a shear pin — the last is a $1.72 part ($9.53 for the kit) | $0–$600+ |
| Starts, then dies or hunts and surges | Small engine starts then dies | A restricted jet or a blocked vent, not a dying engine — check the cap before the carburetor; a vented fuel cap is $23.29 | $4.62–$272 |
| Smoking — black, white or blue | Lawn mower smoking | Depends entirely on the color, and one of the three can be nothing at all | $0–$909+ |
| Pressure washer: no pressure, pulsing, no soap | Pressure washer problems | The nozzle or the tap, not the pump — seven of nine faults are under $51 | $0–$218 |
| Chainsaw or trimmer: won’t start, won’t idle | Chainsaw or trimmer won’t start | Fuel that has gone off, a fouled plug, or a carbon-plugged muffler screen | $81 flat + parts |
Prices are published ranges, dated on each page. Verified August 2026; next scheduled review November 2026, the three-month clock prices carry here.
Why symptoms and not codes
Site-wide, this is the thing that makes small engines different from every appliance. They mostly have no fault codes. There is no display, no blink pattern, nothing to look up — so the unit of consolidation here is the symptom, and each page is built as a triage table rather than a dictionary.
The row grammar is not shared, and that is deliberate. Only two of the six carry the whole chain inside the table: snowblower won’t start ends every row on a Go to link, and starts then dies on what it points to. Won’t start stops at what decides the bill — usually whether the part is bundled into a tune-up or carries its own labor. Smoking and pressure washer problems stop at the price. And chainsaw or trimmer prices nothing in its triage table at all, because on handheld equipment a shop’s flat rate lands before any part does — HDR’s $81.00 handheld service is listed “+ parts and tax” and is already 29–41% of a new Echo before those parts. What every page does share is the order: a symptom becomes a cost answer, and only then a repair-or-replace question.
Why a symptom’s cost bracket surprises people
A symptom’s cost bracket almost never matches how bad it feels.
“Won’t start” reads like the end of the machine. It prices at $105–$256. What Briggs & Stratton names as the most common cause is stale fuel, dirt and debris, and a spark plug is a $4.79–$7.99 part. Meanwhile a mower that runs perfectly but has a slight rear-end shudder can be a $625–$2,500 transaxle.
That gap is the reason this section exists. Three of these six pages put the likely bill in the first two paragraphs, before any diagnosis, so you can decide how worried to be. The three that do not each open on something a price cannot settle. Pressure washer and chainsaw or trimmer open on a published specification, because on both machines the number that decides the outcome is a spec and not a price. Starts then dies opens on the diagnostic order two manufacturers publish for it, and reaches its first part price a paragraph later.
What each page is ordered by differs, and each one says which. There is no single right sort key here. Snowblower won’t start is grouped by what the machine is doing, and its first row is old fuel because Toro’s technical service department calls old gasoline the most common reason a snowblower won’t start. That is why its $170–$236 row sits above its two free checks. It is the only ranked row on the page. Won’t start runs Toro’s two cause lists in Toro’s order and prices them separately; smoking splits by color first and sorts by cost inside the white-and-blue half. Starts then dies is keyed by machine, and inside each row by what to check first — cheapest, except where the page argues a cause is under-diagnosed enough to lead. Pressure washer problems groups by what you can observe, because one observation is several bills: low pressure is a $9.86 nozzle if it faded over months and a $0 spigot if it was never there, and the nozzle’s symptom imitates the $218.32 pump’s. And chainsaw or trimmer follows Echo’s own order of operations, which is a decision tree rather than a list — each step names the branch to take next.
Before you phone anyone
The pages each carry a short list of checks that cost nothing, and they are worth doing first because a shop’s diagnostic fee is $35–$90 before anyone touches the machine.
What they do not carry is a repair procedure. This site describes what a job involves and what it costs; the procedure goes to your machine’s manual and a servicing dealer. That is a firm scope rule and it is set out in the editorial policy. Specifically off-limits: chainsaw chain work, blade removal or sharpening, fuel-system disassembly, and clearing a snowblower auger or chute by hand — the auger and impeller can turn after the engine is off.
Two symptoms are not diagnostic questions at all. A chain or blade that moves while the engine idles, and a machine that has been run indoors or in an attached garage. Stop, and get a dealer. On handheld equipment the first of those has a published number attached: Echo’s GT-225 idles at 3,000 RPM and its clutch engages at 3,800, so 800 RPM is the whole margin.
Have the engine’s numbers ready
Before any phone call about an engine part, find the engine’s own number. Parts and specifications follow the engine, and on a gas mower the engine is often made by a different company from the machine. A Toro or Ariens snowblower is the exception: its engine carries the machine maker’s own brand, and the machine’s model number is the lookup. Where every plate is, by equipment type takes two minutes and saves the call.
Next: with a likely cause, go to what repairs cost to price it properly. If the number is big, repair or replace is the decision page.