What Carb Are You Using??

[71 RAT]

There are 4 or 5 different Holleys, Demon, Quick Fuel and many more! What's everyone using, and I'd like to hear pro's and con's. First plan was a rebuild with a new main body with milled choke horn. Looking at all these choices I'd like to get some feed back. This is a 99% street car, old school 454 BBC rect port solid flat tappet cam, 750 cfm DP. If I'm not whipping on it it's not being driven! I'd love to go multi point EFI, just out of the price range right now.

Will This Winter Ever End?

[Twoblackmarks...]

Oh that Winter!, Soon summer now!

If you have the Money, an high end carb With everything adjustable, With replaceable air bleeds and such is nice, especially if youre gonna "supertune" it on a dyno. I have seen how practical this is on the dyno With my own eyes!

If not maybe an "regular" carb would do?

But I Guess you looking at an Holley HP style carb?

I have had a couple Street Avengers and they work fine, but they seem to be jetted a bit on the lean side out of the box, I have also read that on the internet by other users of them. And of course no replaceable Air bleeds and such.

I have an 870 Street Avenger on a 461 Hyd. Roller Pontiac, it has been jetted 4 Primary and 6 Secondary sizes up on the dyno by the previous owner/ engine Builder. It works OK. I have had other Holleys too and they have never given me trouble.

My dad tried Demon/Barry Grant carburetors (some years ago, 6-7 maybe) on a 383 stroker and a 650HP 350 SBC With old Pontiac Cupcar heads, and he think they worked great but they were very far away out of the Box, so there where much more work baselining them and dialing them in compared to Holleys he think, he have since went back to Holleys. Demon carbs looks good though!

Was this more confusing than god tips maybe? Sorry

The cheapest and most fun would probably be like you said, rebuild With New main body. And use some time adjusting it, hopefully not too troublesome

[71 RAT]

Originally Posted by Twoblackmarks...

Oh that Winter!, Soon summer now!

If you have the Money, an high end carb With everything adjustable, With replaceable air bleeds and such is nice, especially if youre gonna "supertune" it on a dyno. I have seen how practical this is on the dyno With my own eyes!

If not maybe an "regular" carb would do?

But I Guess you looking at an Holley HP style carb?

I have had a couple Street Avengers and they work fine, but they seem to be jetted a bit on the lean side out of the box, I have also read that on the internet by other users of them. And of course no replaceable Air bleeds and such.

I have an 870 Street Avenger on a 461 Hyd. Roller Pontiac, it has been jetted 4 Primary and 6 Secondary sizes up on the dyno by the previous owner/ engine Builder. It works OK. I have had other Holleys too and they have never given me trouble.

My dad tried Demon/Barry Grant carburetors (some years ago, 6-7 maybe) on a 383 stroker and a 650HP 350 SBC With old Pontiac Cupcar heads, and he think they worked great but they were very far away out of the Box, so there where much more work baselining them and dialing them in compared to Holleys he think, he have since went back to Holleys. Demon carbs looks good though!

Was this more confusing than god tips maybe? Sorry

The cheapest and most fun would probably be like you said, rebuild With New main body. And use some time adjusting it, hopefully not too troublesome

It's been a pretty tough winter in New England! Your location is Norway, if I read it correctly. Our winters here are probably like a quick snow quall to you folks. Warm weather is a way's away.

I had issues with 2 truck Avengers and a Street Avenger on my 454 K20. Holley worked pretty had to work things out, very time consuming. I had been a dedicated Holley fan. But, with my crappy luck, doesn't really matter what I buy.

I've driven 3 vehicles with Quickfuel carbs;
69 GTX 440+ Indy heads worked well ran strong
2nd Gen Camaro BB moderately built ran ok
50 Merc SBF awful!
Carburetor is just part of the package, wanted to throw another brand is the mix.

I have not messed with air bleed tuning, jets, squirters, acc. pump cams, etc, I have some experience. It was always seat of the pants tuning, chassis dyno is probably a great tool.

Thanks
I hope your snow melts ASAP

[Twoblackmarks...]

Mild Winter this year actually, until suddenly there was 1-2 months With Extreme snow every day.. But good now! Today you could burn Your tires and the marks would have sticked too the road, that`s when the weather is promising! The problem is I thought I had good time through the Winter getting my car ready, but suddenly summer is almost here! Yipes! (As usual..)

On the carb side, dyno tuning is good to find HP. But I think an Wideband O2 sensor is good to use to tune yourself, I think that can get you far, if not Perfect too, I have not used that myself, but I am gonna try to the summer. So maybe I regret writing this then! But I think an Innovate type logger is best, so you can drive and log how it Works and look over it afterwards and try changes, time consuming though. But fun to tune! And you can use it on more than one car, I Guess a weld in O2 bung is needed to get the best result though.

And the idle setup, if that is good adjusted it Cures most usual "driving" problems it seems, have a good working transition and such, especially on big cam engines, I Guess idle air bleeds is Nice to have then, so you maybe dont have to drill the throttle blades and such.

David Vizards Holley Carb book is Nice, (A New one) I like everything he Writes, since it is easily understanded, even though I often must read stuff many times over again to really understand it, it is written in normal Words and phrases for regular Joes to understand, even if it take a couple reads still to get it in my head... And even then I forget it after a couple days..

But I am in no way an expert on carbs or tuning if I seem to "be that" or make myself to be it, but while I am not on Warren Johnson Level, I am hopefully not totally clueless either

[Windsor GTO]

PRC is built in Texas by Steve Tyler. Customer support is really good. My carb is a 4150 (950 cfm) E85 carb.

[71 RAT]

Originally Posted by Twoblackmarks...

Mild Winter this year actually, until suddenly there was 1-2 months With Extreme snow every day.. But good now! Today you could burn Your tires and the marks would have sticked too the road, that`s when the weather is promising! The problem is I thought I had good time through the Winter getting my car ready, but suddenly summer is almost here! Yipes! (As usual..)

On the carb side, dyno tuning is good to find HP. But I think an Wideband O2 sensor is good to use to tune yourself, I think that can get you far, if not Perfect too, I have not used that myself, but I am gonna try to the summer. So maybe I regret writing this then! But I think an Innovate type logger is best, so you can drive and log how it Works and look over it afterwards and try changes, time consuming though. But fun to tune! And you can use it on more than one car, I Guess a weld in O2 bung is needed to get the best result though.

And the idle setup, if that is good adjusted it Cures most usual "driving" problems it seems, have a good working transition and such, especially on big cam engines, I Guess idle air bleeds is Nice to have then, so you maybe dont have to drill the throttle blades and such.

David Vizards Holley Carb book is Nice, (A New one) I like everything he Writes, since it is easily understanded, even though I often must read stuff many times over again to really understand it, it is written in normal Words and phrases for regular Joes to understand, even if it take a couple reads still to get it in my head... And even then I forget it after a couple days..

But I am in no way an expert on carbs or tuning if I seem to "be that" or make myself to be it, but while I am not on Warren Johnson Level, I am hopefully not totally clueless either

When I did my 3" mandrel exhaust I did put bungs in for 02 sensors. That's as far as I got on that. Cam is not that big and don't have idle issues. Have a part throttle stumble, just recently. Haven't touched it in years, may need a basic clean up, oh kit. We have 15% ethanol (or 10% can't remember) A person can learn something from every and anybody! I check out that book. Thanks
And I, LOVE MAKING BLACK MARKS TOO!!

Originally Posted by Windsor GTO

PRC is built in Texas by Steve Tyler. Customer support is really good. My carb is a 4150 (950 cfm) E85 carb.

Is he in Huston? I'll check it out.
Thanks

[Blake Foster]

What is this Carb you speak of?

[surewhynot]

I have had both a holley and a demon on my 327. the demon was a road demon in the 650 range cfm (purchased almost 10 years ago) holley is a 2 corner idle 650 DP 4150. The demon was pretty far off out of the box but when dialed ran pretty well, although it was always a bit rich, i have heard from several people demons are generally bigger than advertised. The holley has been more manageable in terms of getting the mixture right, and seems to run better to me, could just be mind games. If you want a holley go to ebay and find holley's store, that is where i got mine, than are deemed refurbs, but the holley tech i spoke to said that they are generally new carbs that someone bought ran and didnt know how to tune it right so they returned it as defective. Then holley goes through it (replaces parts as needed) then retunes it. My carb looked brand new when i got it. They normally have a good selection there too, mild to wild.

[InfernalVortex]

I run a Holley 4777 650 DP. It was a "refurbished" unit with no problems. It looked pretty new to me. The engine is a mild vortec 350. No complaints except if I had to do it over again I'd probably run an electric choke.