Tired of TBI issues, what size carb???

[jimbonice]

It really is a misnomer that a big block tbi gets better economy than a carb. I've owned 454 quadrajets and vortecs, 460 carb's and multipoint, new hemi and a 8.0 V10, and Ford 6.8 V10's. In one ton trucks the fuel economy was within spitting distance amongst them all. Weight and gearing make the biggest difference, but in 6-8000lb road pigs, gas mileage sucked.

Carbs are cheap; for example a brand new Sean Murpy qj is $3-400. Its cheap, reliable and will a last a long time.

[BigBlocksRule]

A screwed up tune that's overly rich isn't the standard, it's rare and you just made my point. Carb'd engines are easy to flood out by folks that don't know what they're doing...which included most folks back through the 60's through 80's. Can't do that with a stock tuned TBI. Floorboard it when you're trying to start it and it won't flood out, the computer still meters the correct amount of fuel needed to start. Screw with the tune and you'll wash the cylinder walls, just like an overly rich running carb.
Overdrive helped? Give me a break - "back in the day", if you got 100K miles out of an engine before it's first overhaul, it was a rarity. I'm tearing down engines with 150K+ with no wear versus early engines with less than 100K that may or may not clean up at .030 over due to the big ridge at the top of the bores. These are engines built in the '80's, no synthetic oils, either. And the material that the blocks are cast out of doesn't contain as much nickel as the early stuff - don't need it, they don't wear nearly as bad.
Start up sooner and warm up quicker? That sounds like something that's better than a carb. Still BS though, time an electric choke against an EFI high idle start time, they're about the same in moderately cold weather.
I didn't come up with this on my own - it's been echoed by every decent mechanic I know. Why do you think an LS engine can only be overbored a small bit? NO WEAR, no reason to have cylinder walls that can take a .060 overbore.
An engine with properly set up and tuned EFI will make exactly the same power as one with a carb. Racers don't want to take the time to learn EFI, just like most of 'em don't want to take the time to learn the intricacies of a carb...but most of 'em know a carb guy.

[trac209]

Glad you figured it out but to ad to the whole carb debate for a sec,yes carbs are very old tech but the combustion engine really hasn't in terms of how it works. Fuel compression and spark that's it. How it gets delivered effects how an engine will run. I will say this though if I'm going to choose any vehicle to break down on the side of the road with I'd prefer a carb engine.
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[jimbonice]

Originally Posted by BigBlocksRule

A screwed up tune that's overly rich isn't the standard, it's rare and you just made my point. Carb'd engines are easy to flood out by folks that don't know what they're doing...which included most folks back through the 60's through 80's. Can't do that with a stock tuned TBI. Floorboard it when you're trying to start it and it won't flood out, the computer still meters the correct amount of fuel needed to start. Screw with the tune and you'll wash the cylinder walls, just like an overly rich running carb.
Overdrive helped? Give me a break - "back in the day", if you got 100K miles out of an engine before it's first overhaul, it was a rarity. I'm tearing down engines with 150K+ with no wear versus early engines with less than 100K that may or may not clean up at .030 over due to the big ridge at the top of the bores. These are engines built in the '80's, no synthetic oils, either. And the material that the blocks are cast out of doesn't contain as much nickel as the early stuff - don't need it, they don't wear nearly as bad.
Start up sooner and warm up quicker? That sounds like something that's better than a carb. Still BS though, time an electric choke against an EFI high idle start time, they're about the same in moderately cold weather.
I didn't come up with this on my own - it's been echoed by every decent mechanic I know. Why do you think an LS engine can only be overbored a small bit? NO WEAR, no reason to have cylinder walls that can take a .060 overbore.
An engine with properly set up and tuned EFI will make exactly the same power as one with a carb. Racers don't want to take the time to learn EFI, just like most of 'em don't want to take the time to learn the intricacies of a carb...but most of 'em know a carb guy.

I don't disagree with the premise that tbi can and does burn much cleaner. But does it matter in practise in vehicles like mine that are toys for the most part. A lot of these old trucks aren't daily drivers and put on fairly limited miles in a year and may never wear enuff to be taken apart. My carbed 460 had over 400,000 k on it when I sold it in 2003 and it still purred. It was my plow truck, had a hard life and it is still on the road.

For $300 we can all buy an aftermarket 4l60e or 4l80e trans controller and run it behind a carb as well.

I would not have retrofitted a carb on my hemi Ram, V10 Ram, or triton V10 but I wouldn't spend the money to fuel inject my 454 either. I don't see a payback.

[Skunksmash]

Originally Posted by jimbonice

Man, I've lived in places that get to -40 and carbs was all we had. They started then.

Surely you are familiar with the carb's reputation for being cold blooded? Pretty much every person I know who drove back when carbs were the norm will talk about how they get cold blooded eventually. Sure that's when they start aging but its not a trait of EFI. And those people are just your average joes who don't WANT to have to learn this stuff and do this tuning. They just want it to work. While I'm a bit of a gearhead myself, I too, just want it to work. I don't want to worry about:

"Ugh... what's my carb doing? Did it finally get old? What's wore out? What is it time to do maintenance on, on it? What needs tuned or replaced?" While I'm on the side of the road somewhere. With EFI, you just don't have these potential concerns. I just want to plug, and play. EFI is so easy imo. You got a plug on each end. Plug it in and go. Wanna change the tune? Press this button. I view carbs as leaky old high maintenance antiques. Just my personal, and humble, opinions.

[BigBlocksRule]

Injection will leave you on the side of the road, too....just doesn't tend to happen as often.

Reliability of pretty much everything has gone up (yeah, right!), so none of 'em has as much trouble as before.

Speaking of stuff leaving you on the side of the road, an old mechanic told me once that anything mechanical is subject to failure at any time. He's the main reason I hate flying

[jimbonice]

I cant recall ever being left on the side of the road because a carb failed.
Fuel pump, sure. I do know when my 2008 Buick quit on the side of the road, all i could do was open the hood and look at it. I'm not discounting the benefits of tbi; I am saying that tbi is not the answer to every ill a gas engine has. There is no magical increase in economy, or reliability and if that's the expectations for doing it, disappointment will follow. A profound truism I learned a long time ago is "if it's got tires or a dress it
is going to give you problems".

I had the chance not long ago to buy a 12 valve Cummins for my truck. No question way better economy and it would be cool. Also no question that there would never be a payback to my wallet because I don't drive my truck 60,000 miles per year. That money is going towards a future rebuild of my big block, instead.
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[zombiescustoms]

Holy hijack batman!
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