Carter Carb Help

[rich weyand]

[quote=Hewfil1;7718913]

Originally Posted by hatzie

You'll need to do some legwork. I'm no fan of Holley carbs but they can be made to work well.
The 1400 series Edelbrock has a following and you can get support here.
gregski likes his Holley.
/QUOTE]

I've been doing a little looking, it seems the Edelbrock 1406 (non-EGR) will be my best bet of carbs being it's a clone of the Carter I have.

Yeah, though you do have to do a bit of work on it.

One is to set the float height. They are always wrong, right out of the box.

To do that, you need a new gasket between the upper and lower.

Another is to put the pump shot to the richest setting. Our truck engines pull a lot of vacuum, so the air rush in is pretty high.

Another is to lean it out a bit. They are set up to the rich side from the factory so people who just throw them on an engine don't burn their valves. With the high vacuum, though, our engines pull harder on the gas than they are set up for.

one solution is to go one step leaner on the jets front and rear. Front is .098 and rear is .095 out of the box. Put the .095s in the front and put a new set of .092s in the rears is one solution.

I left the .095s in the back, went to .092s in the front, and then went to .062/.052 needles. That works, too.

You have to have the carb apart to change the jets, so do that while you are setting up the floats.

Also, go to the 8" step-up springs. The step-up springs should be about half the idle vacuum. The carb comes with 5" springs, but you are probably pulling more like 16-18" of vacuum at idle.

[Hewfil1]

Originally Posted by rich weyand

Yeah, though you do have to do a bit of work on it.

One is to set the float height. They are always wrong, right out of the box.

To do that, you need a new gasket between the upper and lower.

Another is to put the pump shot to the richest setting. Our truck engines pull a lot of vacuum, so the air rush in is pretty high.

Another is to lean it out a bit. They are set up to the rich side from the factory so people who just throw them on an engine don't burn their valves. With the high vacuum, though, our engines pull harder on the gas than they are set up for.

one solution is to go one step leaner on the jets front and rear. Front is .098 and rear is .095 out of the box. Put the .095s in the front and put a new set of .092s in the rears is one solution.

I left the .095s in the back, went to .092s in the front, and then went to .062/.052 needles. That works, too.

You have to have the carb apart to change the jets, so do that while you are setting up the floats.

Also, go to the 8" step-up springs. The step-up springs should be about half the idle vacuum. The carb comes with 5" springs, but you are probably pulling more like 16-18" of vacuum at idle.

Apparently Edelbrock also makes them leaner from factory for "fuel economy". I have a truck made for power, I don't want economy. Dangit Edelbrock.

[rich weyand]

Originally Posted by Hewfil1

Apparently Edelbrock also makes them leaner from factory for "fuel economy". I have a truck made for power, I don't want economy. Dangit Edelbrock.

Leaner only in respect to their standard setup. Still too rich for the vacuum signal the carb gets from our truck engines.

My comments above apply to the 1406.

Note that you can run a bit leaner than optimum, but that the correct numbers for best performance on an AF/R meter are well known. My comments above are to optimize those numbers.

[Hewfil1]

Originally Posted by rich weyand

Leaner only in respect to their standard setup. Still too rich for the vacuum signal the carb gets from our truck engines.

My comments above apply to the 1406.

Note that you can run a bit leaner than optimum, but that the correct numbers for best performance on an AF/R meter are well known. My comments above are to optimize those numbers.

Thanks once again Rich. The minute that carb goes on and I have it tuned, you'll be the first one to hear about it.