Tuning a carb for 1st gear performance

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I still dont think the single plane is whats causing this. Regardless of the manifold, the car should not instantly DIE when you floor the pedal.
 
I knoe it may sound obvious, but check your fuel pump, and like you said, look for vacuum leaks. If its timing, then it would have to be off quite a bit inorder to immediately die when you give it a quick, full shot at the throttle. I agree, the single plane manifold hurts low end on a lower compression street motor, but its -not- the heart of the problems you are having. Check fuel pressure if possible.
 
Well, I found someone to trade my manifold with for a dual plane. We just got snow here in Denver so once it melts I'll hunt for vacuum leaks and check fuel pressure.
 
As others have said,the intake is killing you.

I have a stock 318 with a Edelbrock performer,Edelbrock 600,stock gears and it will come out of the hole real nice.It is all about the proper parts and tunning at this point.

Cant say enough about the Edelbrock performer intake,that should be your next buy.You can find them for around $100.00.

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The dual plane is going on. That is a given at this point. However, I seriously SERIOUSLY doubt that the manifold is making the car act as if god himself told the car to stop. It doesnt stutter or do anything if I floor it, it just DIES. As in the motor literally stops turning instantly.
 
Nobody's debating that it's the single cause. You're right in thinking that it shouldnt die totally. You can tune that giant bog out. But, if you consider removing the carb, pulling the top, and peaking at it tuning, you're mistaken. You will need to buy the strip tuning kit, a vaccum gage, a timing tape, and a timing light if you dont have them. Then you'll need to start correcting one thing at a time. It will get a bit better. But when it's as good as you can possibly get it, you will switch the manifold, and it will be much better still. If you can borrow the timing light, the rest of the stuff might run you $75, mostly in the strip kit for the edelbrock carb.
 
moper said:
Nobody's debating that it's the single cause. You're right in thinking that it shouldnt die totally. You can tune that giant bog out. But, if you consider removing the carb, pulling the top, and peaking at it tuning, you're mistaken. You will need to buy the strip tuning kit, a vaccum gage, a timing tape, and a timing light if you dont have them. Then you'll need to start correcting one thing at a time. It will get a bit better. But when it's as good as you can possibly get it, you will switch the manifold, and it will be much better still. If you can borrow the timing light, the rest of the stuff might run you $75, mostly in the strip kit for the edelbrock carb.
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I totally agree with this. Get the vacuum gauge because it can tell you much about how a motor is running. Check this link out:

http://www.gregsengine.com/vacuum.htm

This will enable you to have a starting point on what is causing the giant bog. Go down the chart and see where your motor matchs far as the vacuum chart at the bottom of the page. Also with a timing light find out where you are far as timing.

I don't want to be a a-hole but you are not paying attention with the questions these guys are asking. Like longarm: was the cam degreed when installed?
timing chain wore out?
check tdc against balancer marks.

I wouldn't worry about the intake right now you can change and correct that on down the road. If it dies from idle to when you nail the gas and also not under load then it isn't the intake. Focus on getting the timing right and then tune the carb.
 
moper said:
Nobody's debating that it's the single cause. You're right in thinking that it shouldnt die totally. You can tune that giant bog out. But, if you consider removing the carb, pulling the top, and peaking at it tuning, you're mistaken. You will need to buy the strip tuning kit, a vaccum gage, a timing tape, and a timing light if you dont have them. Then you'll need to start correcting one thing at a time. It will get a bit better. But when it's as good as you can possibly get it, you will switch the manifold, and it will be much better still. If you can borrow the timing light, the rest of the stuff might run you $75, mostly in the strip kit for the edelbrock carb.
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I've got everything but the vacuum guage. We did tear the carb down with the edelbrock strip kit, and got the tuning kit for it as well. Timing tape is already on there, and the only thing I didnt do was retime the cam myself. The guy I bought motor from told me that it was set correctly. Looks like I might have to pull the front off to check it myself once this snow thaws.
 
So what are the specs on the rest of it then? Base timing? Total timing? Idle vaccum level in gear? (the vaccum/pressure gage is like $10 at any auto part store.)
A quick way to see if the cam is in right is a basic compression test. With an XE262 and stock internals, I would be looking for somewhere around 140 on the low side. If it's lower than 130, pull the cover...
 
Ok, later today I'll be hooking up my new vacuum guage and compression guage. I'll post results when i get them.
 
XakEp said:
Ok, later today I'll be hooking up my new vacuum guage and compression guage. I'll post results when i get them.
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Cool!

Let us know what you find. :salute:
 
YOu guys are going to give me so much crap. We hooked the vacuum guage up and got half an inch. We were like, what the hell? We started looking at everything, and my friend reached back to adjust the timing on the distributor and got a massive shock. While he was hopping around holding his hand, I took a closer look at the distributor.

Cylinder #7 didnt have the wire hooked up, and #2 was about to fall off.

I do not know how that happened, or when. But suffice it to say that now the car goes. If I stomp it now, it doesnt stall. Doesnt really go anywhere but it _DOES_ spit out a series of fireballs out the intake so I think the timing needs to be backed off. The car drives smooth and I'm loving it, just a question of getting the timing set properly.

Thanks to everyone who helped! It was a fail to fire on at least one cylinder.
 
lol! That'll do it! Atleast it was a easy fix so i dont think we'll give you fuss over it. :D Much better than a dead cyl! Definately have a look at your timing, good luck with it.

-Mike
 
Why would we give you crap for finding the problem??? At least you've spent a few bucks on what you need to tune it anyway. Sure beats buying an intake, eh?


Now, on that "installing spark plug wires 101 deal"... ;)
 
Glad you found the problem !!!

My 318 runs best just a tick advanced over the stock setting.
 
Well, for those following my saga here's an update. A member on this board offered to trade his Eddy Performer manifold (dual plane) for my M-1 single plane. I have installed it and have only a few things left to hook up on it and I'll be taking it out for a drive.

I'll post here what the results are going from to single plane to dual plane are for the archives and anyone else that was stupid enough to do what I did.
 
cool deal, make sure you leave a good amount of time for the intake ends (rtv?) to seal up. I usually go overnight, retorquing after a couple heat cycles helps too :D good luck.
 
today was the only day this week I've had good enough weather to do this. Likely I'll let it sit until sunday when the snow coming in tomorrow melts.
 
LOL, I think you owe your buddy a few beers for bieng the human spark finder! Glad to hear you found the bigger part of your issues.

P.S. that's exactly why I want to upgrade to a male terminal cap.
 
Well, got it started for a few minutes but wasnt able to drive it. Its got a small leak at the tstat housing I need to fix, but I've already seen a difference. The single plane took a few tries to start - it would have to crank for a bit to fire. The dual plane fires almost instantly!
 
Took the car out for a spin. For those thinking about putting a single plane on a 318 street car.

DO

NOT

DO

IT.

Night and day, the car is SO much fun to drive. Now I just have to put the nitrous on and GO.
 
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