Found your page about a month ago. Believe we have watched all the projects and enjoyed every one of them. Learned a great deal as well. Thank You for your testimony. Oh how we need those words today. More from the Humble Mechanic
Really liked the video, lots of useful information. I got a Chevy 350 with the same carb on it. When it comes time for a rebuild, I plan on rewatching this video.
I have never once heard anyone express a preference for the old stove pipe chokes over an electric choke, until now that is. We used to swap the stove pipe carbs out for electric choke carbs at the shop I worked at in the 80s. One thing to know about them though, if you don't daily drive your carbureted car these days, the gas will evaporate out of the bowls. Fuel is optimized for fuel injected vehicles these days and what people run into with the electric chokes is that they'll start heating up while you're cranking to fill up the carb then by the time the carb has gas, the choke might be partially open and then the thing still won't start. I personally like to manually fill the bowls before cranking if it's been sitting a week or more.
I Agree 1000% With Everything You Said!!! I Too Fill My Q-Jets With Fuel Before I Try And Start One That Has Been Sitting Too Long!!! Tech Tip: The Ford Canister Fuel Filters With The Quick Connectors And The Top Cut Off Make A Perfect Funnel To Fill A Q-Jet Through The Vent On Top!!! Keep Rocking!!!
This is a Carter AFB (Aluminum Four Barrel) originating in 1957. In my opinion, this and the Carter AVS (Air Valve Secondary) are the best four barrel carburetors with their metering rod & jet design.
That was very interesting! I've owned and worked on a couple of Quadrajets, and I think they've always gotten a bad rap. I had never seen an Edelbrock like that, and I like the design. My '84 truck came with a 305 engine and I swapped in a 350. Seems like it has never performed like I thought it should, though. I believe that with the larger displacement, it is able to maintain more vacuum at full throttle, and this may not be allowing the secondaries to open (it has a vacuum lockout on the secondary metering flaps, and the vacuum must be nearly zero to let them open). It might also not be allowing the power valve (or economizer) to move the primary metering jets to the rich position. I'd need to refer to my notes, but I tested it before, and I think it had to have almost no vacuum to let the rods go up. Maybe I should start with one of them Edelbrocks and get the right one for a 350...... It's got the Electronic Spark Control unit on there, and I'd like to have a way to see whether it's retarding the spark or not. It's a blind system. Anyways, I enjoyed the video and appreciate your good testimony.
Need to verify the secondaries aren't locked out (choke on primaries has to be fully open) Then check the spring tension on the seccondary air doors (the choke plates above secondary) Pull the secondary metering rods and make note of the 2 letter code. From the factory it was probably DP rods which are really lean. You can swap in DH or DR rods to richen it on the secondaries, ought to waken it up a bit.
I had a quadrajet carb on my 1980 Camaro, when one of my son's friends indicated, hey install an alumimum intake and Edelbrock carb. I was not interested that much. Well, when we arrived home from Church two days later, that guy was taking things apart on my Camaro. When I got out of the car, I was looking for where he drained the Antifreeze. Well, thats when I learned, he cracked my intake open without doing that. I ended up with lots of issues at that point. I had the perfect working heat control choke. Than that went away real fast. I was not in a good mood after that day.
