Carb Suggestions

[hotrod98]

Man!!! That has got to be a world record. I have never ever heard of a Holley that has gone 25 years and never needed a fuel bowl gasket or power valve. Send me a picture. A friend of mine bought a Chal T/A new in 70 and it was back at the dealer every couple of months trying to get those carbs tuned. Some people swear by Holleys. I'm just speaking from my experiences. I own nine musclecars. Three of them have Holleys, four of them have afb/avs style carbs, and two of them are fuel injected. I love the fi cars the most. They run so sweet and smooth and never give me any trouble. The afb style carb cars start great, get decent gas mileage and never need gaskets or power valves. The Holleys won't sit very long without giving me trouble. I only find time to drive each of them every other month or so. I guess if I drove them all of the time, I might have less trouble. I tend to not pick the Holley carbed cars when I go to drive one of them and that probably doesn't help things. They're not very old carbs, probably less than 1000 miles on any of them. My two six pack setups are sitting in the cabinet. I keep postponing installing them on any of my cars. I love the Holley (Barry Grant) on my dragster has. It runs 5.20's in the eigth mile. I'm not against Holleys entirely. I just think that if Chrysler thought they were so great that everything they built would have come from the factory with a Holley on it.  Even though MP recommended a 750 Holley for my hemi crate motor, I put an Edelbrock on it. Everybody should use whatever works for them. I just know that I don't have time to screw around with carbs when all I want to do is drive those bad boys. lol   Love this site...keep up the good work.

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[Robb]

Hey Winsotn - I am in the exact same boat. My car is going back together now also. It is going to have a stock cam, dual plane M1 manifold, etc. It had a Holley Street Avenger carburetor on it. I dont know what size it was but it did have a stumble on take off and its pretty nasty looking. I may replace it. Does anyone know what size this is?

Mike,

Did you ever try going to a bigger squirter size to fix that stumble ?   I have found that changing squirters can make a huge difference in getting rid of those bogs.



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general carb opinions/experiences:


On my previous 383 I had a brand new 625 VS Road Demon Carb, and it never idled well. Spent HOURS and HOURS foolin with it.  If the throttle was more than 1/2 way open though it ran OK.  I bought that carb because I was Daily Driving my Challenger at the time.

after a year+ of crappy gas mileage (10mpg) and stinky idling (thinking that the problem couldnt be my carb since it was new and "personally inspected" and flow tested blah blah blah), I needed to establish a baseline, so I bought a used Holley 700 DP off of ebay (for 33% of what I paid for the Demon) and youd a thought it was a different car.   Idle and part throttle were beautiful and purrrring, and my gas mileage went up 30% minimum.  Thats right.  UP.



Later I put that same Demon on a 66 Oldsmobile 425.  Ran crappy still, and ended up selling the car, telling the buyer he needed to get rid of that lousy carb.   


Ive got the 700dp on the 440 now but Im going to go to something bigger in the long run.  Its just nice to have a "known good" carb on the 440 when I finally get to break in the cam and tune the system.  (still waiting on Keisler to ship the Flywheel.....  sigh)


The Sport Satellite (which is a garage queen, no plates or anything) still has the original Carter carb on its 383, and Ive rebuilt it once.  Easy to rebuild, but if that carb wasnt original to the car, Id still probably throw the Holley 700 on it.

[miketyler]

Did you ever try going to a bigger squirter size to fix that stumble?

no, I never looked into it - I made the determination that I would address it after I put a stock cam back in it. The Holley is pretty dirty although its supposed to have had less than 5K miles on it. Also, it got TERRIBLE gas mileage. I dont know if it needed to adjusted or what but since most all else is going in new, I was considering buying a Road Demon or something smaller with vacuum secondaries.

also, i noticed you have a '95 sc400....how are you enjoying that?  i had a '92 sc300 5-speed and loved it.

Hey Winston - yes, the SC400 has truly been the nicest and most reliable car I have owned yet. VERY smooth, handles great with the independent suspension, leather and wood interior fit&trim is stunning. Am sure your SC300 was the same way but all components under the hood are shock mounted. The SC400 radiator fan is powered by a hydraulic motor and pump - a technological first. No wires at all. Its no wonder those cars were $70K when they were new. I just hit 154K last week on it. Shes just getting broke in good.  :thumbs:     

 

[Winston]

Mike,

I hear ya, bud...if you want a comfortable ride with amazing response and reliability, the Lexus is hard to beat.  I remember when I had mine, I would take it the dealership to get the oil changed, and the mechanics would have nothing to do if it weren't for folks taking their cars in for scheduled maintenance.  Nothing ever breaks on them.  For a sports car, it truly is unusually comfortable.  Selling mine was a big mistake...the cockpit in those SC's are so awesome.


All,
Thanks again for all the talk about carbs.  It makes it tough to decide which way I want to go since everyone has their preferences, but it's great to hear true stories about the different brands, sizes, etc.  I'll be sure to keep y'all informed on which route I take; at this point, I might rebuild that AFB and use it until I can set funds aside for a brand new one.  Money is always an issue, and I still need to buy new interior, exhaust and some 15"x7" rally wheels and tires, so if this ol' AFB will operate OK, I might throw that on for the time being.

Look forward to meeting those of y'all who will be at Carlisle on Friday.   

Winston