1988 Mercury 20 carb rebuilt, need help aka pappy

Good evening all,

First of all I welcome any and all help. Just wanted to snag Pappys attention! As for my issue, I brought my 1988 Mercury 20 to the river yesterday. It ended up dieing on me so I had to troll back to the ramp. Got home, pulled the carb. Found the needle and seat was stuck, pulled the needle out and the rubber tip came right off. Also found the fuel pump to be nearly eaten through.

So, carb kit is on order. My motor is an 0B293861, which comes up as an 88. The kit I ordered was a 9802 carb kit. The kit shows a S/S needle with standard replaceable seat. My current needle is rubber tipped and the seat is non replaceable. So what in the world do I do? There's no info to speak icon the net that I can find. I would assume a metal On metal seat isn't correct?

You will be good. That is how they are now,better.

Just called Mercury customer service. Found out something interesting. The serial number on my motor comes back as a 25 hp motor, however, the carb on the motor is stamped "30". The "30" carbs are for 20 hp engines and the 31/31 and 31A carbs are for 25 ho engines. So effectively from what the Mercury support guy told me was I can pickup a 31, 31A or 32 carb and make my 20 into a 25.

Also, he did inform me I can use the straight S/S needle in replacement of the rubber tipped S/S needle. Looks like I'm in business! Now just need to get the carb kit from Florida and rebuild.