Timing an Onan engine

[Bro. Noble]

The 24 hp Onan engine on our WM acts like it is timed too fast.  It cranks real slow even though the battery is fully charged.  Sometimes when you turn on the ignition key (without engaging the starter) to move the head,  it will "whump' as it ignites fuel in the cylinder.  I'm not sure if this is related to the hard cranking.  All of these symptoms occur when the engine is cold or warmed up.  The cranking is more of a problem in cold weather,  but not that much different.  Sometimes it will crank very slowly and then all of a sudden turn normally.

The engine manual doesn't address timing.  Can the timing be easily adjusted,  or should I be looking for other problems?  Thanks.

[isawlogs]

 Noble , Mine was doing something like that .. hard to turn over when either real cold or real hot ... neded up changing the starter , it had a flat spot on it ,and was drwaing a lot of amps for some other reason ....  any hows ... you might want to check the sarter and see how many amps its pulling ....

   The other thing I would do is check all grounds , ya might have one that is coroded .

[sawdust]

check the battery too, that describes perfectly my engine starts with a dying battery.
It shows good charge but I could not draw fast from it.