I don't remember them that well but I remember my dad flooding his Lada a couple of times. However when modern sensors go wrong I would love to be able to adjust the choke instead of relying on temperature sensors and stuff to work out how much fuel needs to be squirted.
Between us we have had 6 fuel injection/electronic ignition cars since 1998 and the sensors have played up on every car but they are a lot more reliable than the old system. I personaly beleieve that electronic ignitions make modern cars more reliable rather than just fuel injection and out of the 6 cars we only ever had to replace one coil pack.
Dizzy'a always seemed to need constant attention.
Edited by Rattle on 29/04/2009 at 17:36
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Why would anybody want them back. I cannot remember the last time that a car would not start for me. Well, I can. It was about 5 years ago, an early 80s Polo (solved with new plugs and leads - hang on, isn't that a different thread on here...).
Who writes on a car ad "starts first time every time" these days?
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My first car a little Uno had a Carb and manual choke. What's so hard about using a choke if you have some mechanical sympathy? It didn't need that much choke at all. I like Carbs myself, I think a well set up carb gives much better engine response than fuel injection in the main. Barring out and out sports cars tuned for response, a lot of petrl engines have a leaden feel to them now: Take ages to spin up and just as long to spin down. I guess that is due to the flywheel as much as anything though.
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>>I like Carbs myself I think a well set up carb givesmuch better engine response than fuel injection in the main.
mmm..Personally I'm really struggling to see how on earth a carb. could ever match the more or less infinitley variable fuelling available from ECU controlled fuel injection :-/ It is fair to say I suppose that modern cars have their ECU mapping optimised for emissions not responsiveness.
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I miss hanging the clothes peg around the choke pull in the morning - had the same control on a number of cars, and the twist lock mechanism NEVER worked. The other part of the morning ritual I remember was squirting Brady's Easy Start down the carb intake and dousing the HT leads and distributor in WD40 - I think we call it character in a car now.
Both our cars now are diesels, so no such fun in the mornings.
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>>"Choke as a handbag hook" story
Not quite:
Father-in-law bought a secodhand Mini which used to run obviously rich. He reckoned even in the coldest weather you could push the choke all the way in after a hundred yards.
I did some job on it for him and adjusted the mixture.
I heard he took it to a local garage because 'since that son-in-law of mine did something to it I can't push the choke in for up to two miles on cold days'.
They adjusted it rich for him. It regularly fouled plugs.
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I had a Skoda that was set with a tiny whisker of choke. Noticing this I lengthened the cable a bit, but the carb wouldn't idle when properly adjusted. The cause was a porous casting.
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carbs with automatic chokes common in the 70s/80s were probably at least as reliable as modern injection systems with their plethora of sensors scattered around the place.
Starting problems by then were, as I remember it, more likely to be ignition related than carb related.
Sure they were more prone to wear and sometimes needed adjusting but that was comparatively simple to do.
The real reason for their demise, from what I remember, was the emissions requirements, especially the advent of catalysts.
Manual chokes were an art in themselves but one you could feel quite chuffed at when you mastered it.
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carbs with automatic chokes common in the 70s/80s were probably at least as reliable as modern injection systems
no no NO NO NO Three million times NO
I have many tales to tell of auto choked carbs faling to deliver the goods on a cold frosty morning, and no stories of fuel injected cars.
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Different experiences mate, between 1978 and 1993, I put about 400K miles on a succession of cars with carbs with autochokes without a single failure. The first 100K of that was while I was living in Newcastle on Tyne with real winters not the soft southern stuff I am used to now never had a car fail to start in that time.
In the last 10 years I have had sensors fail on 4 separate occasions and 4 separate cars in my family. The injection systems themselves have been OK it's the sensors I have seen problems with.
Edited by commerdriver on 29/04/2009 at 18:45
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I've owned:
One manual choke car (mk 1 jetta), always started.
One auto choke car (1.6 twin carb 405), always started if you knew how to fettle it, drank like a fish despite endless attempts at tuning it, needed a new waxstat every couple of months to be at all driveable until it was hot.
Two fuel injected cars, both exemplary.
I'll take fuel injection every time thanks.
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My Kia Pride's got a twin choke. Remember the 'feel' of the spring on the second choke. Woe betide you if you open it below 2K RPM, but it gives a nice surge when you use it.
It's also got an auto choke - kick the throttle to set it. Curious behaviour. The tickover will rise fairly quickly to 3K and then slowly fall back to a lumpy 500 before settling about 800 as the temperature rises. I'm not touching the carb, too many vacuum pipes and solenoids. It passes the MOT emissions, starts and runs reliably. Let sleeping dogs lie.
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Yes, too true.
Its not a good thing if a car only needs a little choke to start from cold as the implication is that its therefore running too rich most of the time!
Personally, I think the SU carb is a thing of wonder and I enjoy tweaking it using my ears and the piston lifting pin in-conjunction with the colortune.
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I should have put "piston lifting pin" in the "when did you last hear" thread.
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A decently set up manual chocked carb, with no nasty diaphragms (ie Ford VV - only ever any good as a garage door stop) for me please.
if it goes wrong, it can normally be repaired with a screwdriver and a pair of pliers, not a computer and a wallet full of cash.
I can honestly say I never had any problems starting my carbbed cars hot or cold. but there again, I always made sure they were adjusted correctly, and the breather system was clean.. thats what caused a lot of running problems - blocked breathers.
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I had 7 cars that were fitted with SU carbs and never had any trouble with any of them, but the Citroen BX that had a Webber fueling it, never ever ran properly in the 5 years i had it despite many visits to the dealer, my trusted indie and a carb specialist.
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the Citroen BX that had a Webber fueling it neverever ran properly in the 5 years i had it
I would have tried lowering the float level, if set too high (for the carb, some wanted to be slightly lower than the spec said) they ran like pigs.. I think the accelerator jet dribbled the excess fuel....
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the Citroen BX that had a Webber fueling it neverever ran properly in the 5 years i had it
"I would have tried lowering the float level, if set too high (for the carb, some wanted to be slightly lower than the spec said) they ran like pigs.. I think the accelerator jet dribbled the excess fuel.."
I wish this forum had existed in 1992, that information could have saved me a lot of grief & cash !
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Im not saying it would have cured it... but it would have been one of the things Id check, after air leaks etc....
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The main problem was trying to cruise at 50/60 on a light throttle, it would suffer from what i think the trade called "nodding", ie feeling slightly jerky ! The carb specialist improved it by trying different sizes of main jets and air screws, but as i said it was never 100%
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While the 2E2 carb fitted to many VWs strikes terro into the heart of many, the 4A1 carb fitted to Mercs, BMWs and some Vauxhalls really was a monster of a carb - really very nasty and very difficult to set up and make the engine run properly. The top plate of the carb and the spindle with the choke flaps on it would warp and bind up - getting that to turn freely was half of the battle. New covers and spindles were very expensive.
Ford's VV carb was actually OK - if you knew how to work on it, and what its main faults were. I sorted quite a few out who had been round the other garages and were on the verge of buying a conversion, which was quite satisfying.
SUs, of course were easy to work on, but equally easy to get wrong. It all got rather interesting with the electronic controlled HIFs on the Maestros.
Sidedraft carbs, usually on exotic cars were good to set up properly, there was certainly a sense of acheivment, and it was good to hear a car go out running much better than when it came in.
One late 80's early 90's oddity was the 2EE electronic carb - it had a fast acting "choke" flap which dynamically changed the mixture - this could be used in conjunction with a lambda sensor to provide a closed loop control. It was complex and expensive, and doubtlessly not much more expensive to provide a proper fuel injection system - they didn't last long into the 90's.
However, they're all junk, and utter rubbish when compared with a modern fuel injection system, and apart from historic interest, I'm glad to see the back of them.
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Good old carburetters - what an ironic title for a thread.
I well remember the problems with carbs on cars I had in the 70s and 80s. The Mk2 Escort whose manual choke required adjustment to microscopic precision to persuade it fire up on a cold morning. The unfathomable Solex 2E2(?) on a Passat that never worked properly after I replaced the diaphragm for the second choke. The automatic choke on the Solex 35TACIC on my Peugeot 305 that disintegrated into a thousand pieces at the start of a long and important journey. The twin carbs on a Dolomite 1850 and later on an MG Midget that needed retuning every 2 miles to stop them fouling the plugs.
Thankfully all that is behind us now. We have electronic multipoint fuel injection and what a great invention it is. Along with electronic ignition it means that car servicing these days is an annual rather than a weekly (or, in the case of the Mk2 Escort, daily) affair and I can spend my weekends doing things other than making sure my car makes it through to the next weekend without breaking down. Like I said in another thread, cars in the 70s were crap. Carbs are one reason why.
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However, they're all junk, and utter rubbish
No, not really. As you say, some complex model-specific carbs were a pain. Ford automatic chokes were a pain (and well worth replacing with a retrograde but reliable hand choke, something I once did on a ghastly Cortina Mk somethingorother - the big fat useless rustprone cokebottle one).
But they could nearly always be made to work, and in well-conceived applications could return remarkable performance/economy combinations. More importantly, for some time after repmobiles came out of the factory with injection, a carb setup was far better for performance applications, and far more user-friendly. Modern injection arrangements, with the right pipework, can produce proper power curves for motor sport. But they, like carburettors, are fuel-hungry.
Edited by Lud on 29/04/2009 at 21:58
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Goodness you are talking complete tosh Lud
most of the large power outputs and fuel economy we get in modern petrol engines would would not be possible with carbs
Edited by Webmaster on 30/04/2009 at 01:41
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talking complete tosh Lud
No I'm not. There is of course a steady improvement in efficiency with these electronic engines, and they can be chipped to alter their output graphs. But you don't get owt for nowt. Cars that do 0-60 in 5 seconds use more fuel than our runabouts.
Some of these new diesels are very impressive though, have to say.
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most of the large power outputs and fuel economy we get in modern petrol engines would would not be possible with carbs
Certianly the combination of power output, economy and driveability whe get today would not be posiibel with carbs. Not the power output and economy ant the same time mind you.
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>>a carb setup was far better for performance applications
Lud, what have you been smoking?
Carbs were awful for either performance or economy. How on earth can you compare the crude monstrosities with an injection system which calculates the fuel required (and the spark timing), for each individual firing event for each individual cylinder, every time?
Points are another anachronism which no one in their right mind would want to see back.
I would really like to see the hideous poppet valve and it's operating mechanism consigned to the dustbin, and its replacement placed under the control of the engine management computer. Then, you would be able to do away with the lossy throttle valve, and obtain full flexibility on timing rather than being constrained by the cam profile.
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N_C, any idea why a solenoid operated valve system has not appeared yet?
Edited by Old Navy on 29/04/2009 at 22:32
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>>N_C, any idea why a solenoid operated valve system has not appeared yet?
No, I don't know if there's a technical brick wall that everyone has been hitting in development. However, this new Fiat system looks like a step in the right direction;
www.fiat.co.uk/Content/?id=10857
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I thought F1 were using a pneumatic system.
Whatever happened to that?
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>>I thought F1 were using a pneumatic system.
Yes, but, that just closed the valves - a bit like a pneumatic valve spring. Which of course, is a good idea, because a pneumatic spring weighs a lot less than a metal one.
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a carb setup was far better for performance applications
... for some time after repmobiles started coming with injection, yes. At a cost in fuel, peaky power delivery and so on, they gave more power more easily and cheaply than injection and were widely used in motor sport.
All things pass, however. These days as AE points out they are obsolete. Saying things weren't so bad, indeed had a positive side, is not the same as saying you want them all back.
I repeat though that carburettors and points had advantages that electronics don't: they were repairable and adjustable in ways that their electronic equivalents are not, anyway without a lot of kit. Saying electronics are reliable is all very well, but nothing lasts for ever.
the hideous poppet valve and it's operating mechanism consigned to the dustbin, and its replacement ...
er, what would that be then?
... placed under the control of the engine management computer...
Yeah, yeah. Pass the joint.
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>>a carb setup was far better for performance applications
>>they gave more power
I can't agree Lud
>>I repeat though that carburettors and points had advantages that electronics don't: they were repairable and adjustable in ways that their electronic equivalents are not
Yes, and boy did they need all that tweaking and fussing!
>>er, what would that be then?
I don't know, but anything which takes control away from something which is as inflexible as a cam profile, and places it under fast electronic control has to be a good thing for engine efficiency and performance.
Next you'll be lamenting that we don't have atmospheric inlet valves any more!
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atmospheric inlet valves any more!
I was going to ask you and AE what was wrong with a good old wick carburettor actually...
Some carbs and ignition systems stayed in tune well, others didn't. And if Ford Pintos and the like didn't give more power more easily and cheaply with carbs than with injection, why did racers use them?
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However they're all junk and utter rubbish when compared with a modern fuel injection system and apart from historic interest I'm glad to see the back of them.
LOL, I'll second that.The last car I had with a carb. was a 1990 1.8 Cavalier, whilst it never went badly wrong in 196K ( the autochoke function never worked properly though), that's just as well because the array of levers, pipes, adjustment screws and solenoids surrounding the thing was a nightmare to behold.
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Ford's VV carb was actually OK
That is the first time I've ever read or heard anything other than contempt for the thing from a professional. I must admit, I never had major trouble with the one fitted to my early 1.6 Sierra.
I had no trouble with it at all, until the idle suddenly went lumpy and the fuel consumption increased markedly at around 150,000 miles. I had a replacement VV in the shed which had come off a Sierra I'd broken for spares a few months back. My research telling me that dismantling a VV without a thorough understanding of its workings being generally a bad idea, I simply disconnected everything and swapped the whole lot out. Car started and ran perfectly on its "new" carb, and stayed like that until it went to the scrapper some 75,000 miles later.
Edited by DP on 30/04/2009 at 10:27
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I have to say the VV on my 85 sierra was probably the best starter of all my Carbed cars.
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>>That is the first time I've ever read or heard anything other than contempt for the thing from a professional.
Yes, I can't say that I was ever mad keen on them, but, they were OK once you knew how to sort them out.
I've probably mentioned this before, but poke and hope was just as alive in the days of points and carbs as it is today, in the trade as well as in the DIY ranks. I found it strange how so many people around me were diagnosing and fitting new carbs, where with cleaned jets and new diaphragms, and re-adjusted chokes, I very rarely found the need to replace them.
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Im surprised we havent had a "Choke as a handbag hook" story yet. :)
Renault 4?
MD
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>> Im surprised we havent had a "Choke as a handbag hook" story yet. :) >> Renault 4? MD
That was what the gear stick was for, so SWMBO tells me. (we owned 2 of them)
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With auto choke carbs that complicated would it have not been cheaper for GM just to have fited a crude single point injection system in the first place?
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great discussion this one,
of course the injection systems of today are far better than carburettors for performance, reliability, economy etc. All I was hoping to point out earlier was that carburettors were not all junk and certainly were not always breaking down. They were also all that was sensibly available at the time.
The computing power behind modern fuel injection and engine management systems would have filled a fair size room in the 70s and are, i believe, a far cry from the early attempts at fuel injection that were tried by the likes of Triumph in those days.
The one problem with current systems that I have had happen to me is that of sensors failing which, while not strictly part of the fuel injection system is part of the engine management infrastructure that the whole thing relies on and is not a problem we had in the 70s/80s.
I still have one with a carb and it does make me wonder, how do you maintain a 34 year old fuel injection system.
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That is a good point and of course even the earliest computer ECUs just used a ROM table to look at fixed values, e.g "what should I do in this condition" where as modern ECUs do all the calculations based on a 10000's of different combinations of conditions so can calculate everything live.
I think we tend to forget how crude early fuel injection was compared to what we have now.
That said the most common processor used in aircraft autopilot systems is the Intel 80386 try loading a JPEG image on one of those processors they are slow! However they are very reliable and more than fast enough for the autopilot system and are used because they don't get hot like modern processors. I think they have only recently stopped making them for this purpose.
To put that into perspective by 1993/94 the 386 in a PC was obsolete.
I think the only way modern fuel injection/ECU based cars can be improved is to have better fault reporting as even with the codes it is still a bit of a guessing game trying to fix sensor problems.
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- commerdriver i like your post your fired;
Oops wrong sketch,
No i agree with you.
Having been through the era of selling young kids cars with chokes and struggling to get them to understand, while their fathers ooh aahd in the background, we then had single point injectors and a new set of customers that thought you had to put your foot on the gas to start these--with disasterous results and phone calls to the effect id sold a bum car :-(
Nowadays i can sell a multipoint injector car and know it will still start in the morning
its motoring heaven for me ;-)
the carb is dead------good riddance all hail its demise
long live multipoint injection and the ecu--------
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Bellboy you won't be saying that when that 3 pot you have on your lot fails to start tomorrow morning due to some faulty wiring to the crank shaft sensor or something stupid.
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Bellboy you won't be saying that when that 3 pot you have on your lot fails to start tomorrow morning due to some faulty wiring to the crank shaft sensor or something stupid. 3 pot has faults but non starting im afraid isnt one of them
sounding like a digger is one
no power is 2
3 is they wee wee oil out of the oil switch
apart from that they are super
ok they arent but they do start
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You know what I mean :).
Having said that out of the 6 fuel injection cars we have had they have failed to start three times.
1) Escort - Coil and HT leads so not the fuel injections fault
2) My old Fiesta (first one 'rattke') no compression - not injections fault
3) Dads fiesta - battery not i's fualt.
I agree fuel injection systems are much better and I have never driven a car with a choke but I know what one is and how they work. I just think with the massive amounts of sensors we now have it is becoming swings and round abouts.
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sensers go on mileage
you cant make a purse etc out of an old pig
i learned this a long time
just like worn out carbs and throttle spindles
its all mileage related or a poor manufacture of cheap parts for cheap cars think yugo the hugo
Edited by bell boy on 29/04/2009 at 23:40
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I used to enjoy tuning the two twin choke 45 webers on my Caterham. Doubt that the neighbours did.
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i would rather hear 45 webbers on a sunday lunchtime than a horrible electric strimmer
footnote
no i wouldnt i like peace peace peace
:-)
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Spikeyhead's post has just reminded me. Must be the Stoneleigh weekend soon. Kit cars and so on. Went once. Enjoyed it, something a bit different, often weird but fun. Don't forget your anoraks......
;-)
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Much as I like modern cars and their amazing reliability to the seventies stuff, there is something about the simplicity of the older cars which could be fixed with a screwdriver and a Haynes propped open under the bonnet (even if you needed to do it every other week).
Non starters now often mean a trip to the main dealer to have some box of electonics replaced at the cost of a months salary. A bit galling when the most complicated computer in a car probably has the same spec as a pocket calculator.
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I think a modern ECU would be about as powerful as a mid 90's PC if that, I cannot see the processor needing to run at a clock speed of more than 100Mhz and I doubt it would need any more than 16MB of RAM but hopefully people here will know the exact specs of a modern ECU.
I asked on here once before why they are so expernsive for what is essentialy the same computing power as a 90's word processor and the reasons given was the amount of testing and the fact ECUs run in very tough conditions compared to a destop computer
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Back in the 70.s i had both a Triumph 2.5PI MK2, and a Triumph 2500S MK2, the 2500S was fitted with twin SU carbs as against the 2.5's petrol injection. The PI was always first away from the lights and thirstier, but the carbs allowed a much more flexible driving range, and overall I prefered the 2500S.
An earlier poster mentioned Solex carbs on a Triumph? I had a single downdraught Solex on my old "Super Minx" but my MK1 T2000 had twin Strombergs if i Remember Correctly?
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I asked on here once before why they are so expernsive for what is essentialy the same computing power as a 90's word processor and the reasons given was the amount of testing and the fact ECUs run in very tough conditions compared to a destop computer
The Motronic unit in my Volvo uses a Siemens SAB8051 based microprocessor running at an earth shattering 16MHz. The frequency and depth of sensor monitoring and control might be mindblowing in the context of internal combustion engine history, but in modern computing terms, running an engine is really nothing earth shattering at all.
My employer manufactures laser printer controllers which do everything a car engine's ECU does (monitor multiple sensors and stepper motor angles, drive various actuators, motors and solenoids, monitor consumable usage, monitor service intervals, log fault codes, produce diagnostic reports etc) plus be capable of rasterising image data that can run into gigabytes at a rate to feed a print engine capable of anything up to 300 A4 images minute. All this can be typically done with a 300MHz processor (albeit with a good chunk of RAM and a fast hard drive).
As with the car the ECU is being bolted into, the initial R&D forms a big part of the unit cost overall, but at the volumes they are produced, I can't imagine an ECU contains more than a few pounds worth of parts.
The value is in the firmware running on the thing which is what will have taken the real time to develop and debug. The firmware R&D and bugfixes also continue after the hardware manufacture (many cars have software updates as part of a routine dealer service). These are free at point of installation, or at least not itemised on the service bill, so the cost has to be factored in somewhere.
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there is something about the simplicity of the older cars which could be fixed with a screwdriver and a Haynes propped open under the bonnet
You've obviously never had to fix a worn out twin choke Solex carburettor as fitted to late 70s VWs and Peugeots. They are a mechanical masterpiece of levers, ball joints, pipes and more levers. Once some of these mechanical items started to wear, it became almost a throw away item.
A VW indy at the time looked at the 2E2 I'd removed from my decrepit Passat and brought with me to make sure I bought the right needle and float set (remember those?) and said "throw it away and fit a Weber". As this would have cost more than the car was worth, I ignored his advice and spent many happy hours fitting needles, float and gaskets and then trying to persuade the Solex to work properly again.
Although it had to be said that up until wear set in they generally stayed in tune. Unlike SUs, especially when there was more than one on the engine.
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I think it ws the solex 2E2 fitted to my Scirocco in the 80's ... they used to suffer from fuel starvation - turned out to be the needle valve in one of the float chambers in that they would come away from their seat and hence lower the float chamber fuel level, devils own job to discover that fault but - I was a mobile car tuner at the time!
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I think it ws the solex 2E2 fitted to my Scirocco in the 80's ... they used to suffer from fuel starvation
Yep, and when they weren't suffering from fuel starvation they would flood the engine due to the same needle valve sticking open!
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Hehehe! The Good Old Days - bring back the points & condenser that's wot I say :)
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I don't think I would ever buy a car with a dizzy again, you spend far too much time messing about with points, rotar arms etc etc. My car has a very modern system of the coil packs being over the plugs themselves doing away with the HT leads. If my car starts to develop a miss fire diagnoses should be very easy.
I have missed out on this large part of motoring and to be honest I am very glad I did. If I had passed my test in 99 and some how managed to afford a car it would have probably been an 84 Nova or something as horid as that.
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>>>I don't think I would ever buy a car with a dizzy again, you spend far too much time messing about with points, rotar arms etc etc.<<<
Some ya win and some ya lose Rattle ... a condenser would have cost about 50p but I've heard of main dealers charging over £100 to diagnose & replace a coil pack!
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>>Non starters now often mean a trip to the main dealer
Yes, but, the event of a non starter (for other than battery neglect) is so much rarer than it ever was in the rose tinted days of old.
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Didn't Triumph 2.5 PIs have a tendency to catch fire - sometimes both ends at once?
I had many years of SUs and apart from a rebuild for the ones on the Daimler V8 due to old age I don't remember any grief with them. I think they taught the 'feather the throttle' driving style that still means I get more mpg out of any car than SWMBO, much to her annoyance.
I once managed to reset the twin twin-choke Dellortos on the Alfa without any significant problems, too, but I'm not sure I could be bothered to do it these days.
Last car I had with a carb and a choke knob was an '88 Honda Shuttle I owned briefly a few years ago. No problems at all that I remember but it did seem a bit weird at first to have to set the choke - although it only took a couple of cold starts to learn where it had to be. The only problem I had with that car was being stupid enough to sell it.
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The good old S.U. sooooo simple and could be quite economical too. Today's cars stay in tune till death (scrapage) do us part but there was a certain joy in getting your car tuned properly in 'the old day's' as it felt (and went) like a new car!
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My VW Beetle never had any problems starting from cold with the auto choke and 6v electrics. Hot starting was a different matter needing seven-eighths throttle precisely or it would flood and you had to leave it for 10 mins.
I had a Triumph 2000 auto which was a very poor starter and frequent staller until I replaced the diaphragms and reset the linkage from scratch.
Mum's first hateful Morris Minor (she had 2 before bowing to pressure from my stepfather and I to buy a proper car) had what appeared to be gear oil in the SU carb dashpot when she bought it. It was a bit sluggish, even for a Minor. A strip down, clean, recentralise the jet block, Colourtune and 3 in 1 oil in the dashpot made it less embarrassing to drive.
My Jag S-type had 2 SU carbs which I balanced every service with a patent device with tubes and little lozenges dancing up and down, and a Colourtune. Many a Saturday was lost listening to the 2OHC straight 6 burbling away.
The Renault 4 again with 6v electrics had a manual choke and never failed to start, hot or cold. The clutch cable had a life you could measure in days, but that's another story.
The Citroen DS semi-auto needed the idle speed to be spot on otherwise it affected the creep and gear change. Fortunately, it was quite stable once set up.
My Citroen Visa GT had an enormous twin-barrel Weber carb that you could have sent a ferret down. That was always a good starter after I put some Redex down it and gave it a caning but it had stood for 18 months before I took it on. Quite a satisfactory turn of speed for an innocuous ugly French thing.
The last car I had with a carb was a 2CV bought from my wife's sister after she fluttered her eyelashes at me and said "Roxy" would be going to the crusher unless I took it on. No starting problems there, at all.
Carbs added another dimension to a risky and unpredictable motoring life, but now my cars are just diesel journey appliances, I don't miss them at all.
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Yes, fuel injection and electronic ignition has divorced the driver from the realisation that he/she is actually operating a machine.
Its probably to blame for an increasing lack of mechanical awareness and the belief by some that cars are "maintenance free" because by and large they just work nowadays.
Depends wether you want a form of transport (fuel injection) or something that both provides the dual function of transport and a pastime that you have to tend, nurture and put time in to (carburettors).
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Not bad, davidh.
People who genuinely like the automobile - enthusiasts - like carburettors, without being blind to their limitations.
People who merely know about the automobile, or who merely use it - car users - simply don't want to know. Their attitude is ahistorical and macho To them the carburettor is an anachronism like stiff collars, solid tyres or rust-prone box sections. There is something smug about their marked preference for injection, as if this development were in some way the outcome of their own superiority, instead of an accidental occurrence coinciding with their own prime of life.
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People who genuinely like the automobile - enthusiasts - like carburettors without being blind to their limitations. People who merely know about the automobile or who merely use it - car users - simply don't want to know. Their attitude is ahistorical and macho To them the carburettor is an anachronism like stiff collars solid tyres or rust-prone box sections. There is something smug about their marked preference for injection as if this development were in some way the outcome of their own superiority instead of an accidental occurrence coinciding with their own prime of life.
Hello Lud, Its Mr Smug here again. I consider myslef an enthusast. I know about cars, I have the scars on my hands. one or two still dark where engine oil was trapped under them when they healed. I sit here in my fairly stiff collared Gieves and Hawkes pink shirt with silk tie and
Yes
The carburettor is an anachronsim. Its deserves to go the same way as rusty box sections and solid tyres - to oblivion.
Myself and my generation ASPIRED to have an injected car. The infamous "I" badge on the back. I am glad we made it.
Oh and BTW - If injection was good enough for the Messerschmitt Bf 109 in the 1940s then its good enough for me
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>Myself and my generation ASPIRED to have an injected car. The infamous "I" badge on the back. I am glad we made it.<
But that's exactly Lud's point AE - you didn't necessarily 'make it' (although, of course, I don't know anything about running in the company car rat race), you just happened to be in the right place when the technology presented itself. Within a span of a very few years every car - even Fords - had fuel injection.
I've just remembered, I once bought a young Cavalier SRI - chopped in a lovely Lancia when I stupidly thought I ought to have a 'sensible' car for work and sold it in disgust three months later - that came with a sticker right across the back window saying 'INJECTION'. Took me a day to peel the darn thing off...
Edited by mike hannon on 30/04/2009 at 15:20
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>Myself and my generation ASPIRED to have an injected car. The infamous "I" badge on the back. I am glad we made it.< But that's exactly Lud's point AE - you didn't necessarily 'make it' (although of course I don't know anything about running in the company car rat race) you just happened to be in the right place when the technology presented itself. Within a span of a very few years every car - even Fords - had fuel injection.
Half True. Injection had been around for a number of years. The aspiration was born out of the knowledge that an "i" was quicker.
The fatc that "i" has become the norm is just a by product of cost. Its probably costs more now to make a carb than it does 4 injectors and a small box of binary code.
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The fact that "i" has become the norm is just a by product of cost. Its probably costs more now to make a carb than it does 4 injectors and a small box of binary code.
Engineering type question - if you wanted to build a new car with all the catalyst and emission gear now required and use a carburettor, could you? Is it just a matter of cost and efficiency or would it be virtually impossible as an engineering task.
IIRC the advent of injection for "normal" cars seemed to coincide with the introduction of catalysts either to make it work or to compensate for the power loss due to using catalysts.
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Its Mr Smug here again.
I don't think you are smug AE. You have humour and wit. I don't doubt that you understand the jalopy and are an enthusiast in a broad sense.
But your attitude on this and other matters is ahistorical and macho.
The first generations of injected repmobiles weren't all that quick actually. The main selling point was driveability: wide torque band, less pinking and so on. I had an early one, a VW 411. It was a bit thirsty but predictable in its performances and consumptions and fairly reliable.
As so often here, a lot of the argument is due to misunderstanding. Cross purposes. You make a point and people furiously refute some superficially similar but radically different point. All part of the fun.
I do hope by the way that we have that beer some time even if BBD has gone off the radar again.
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Oh and BTW - If injection was good enough for the Messerschmitt Bf 109 in the 1940s then its good enough for me
Spitfires and Hurricanes didnt have fuel injection, now... remind me who won?
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>> Oh and BTW - If injection was good enough for the Messerschmitt Bf 109 in >> the 1940s then its good enough for me >> Spitfires and Hurricanes didnt have fuel injection now... remind me who won?
Only because of the aerodynamics, no the engine. Read this report on a captured Bf109e by the RAE at Farnborough.
www.geocities.com/capecanaveral/hangar/9378/flybf1...l
(read the comments by Hauptmann Gunther Schack at the bottom of the article. Absolutely hilarious)
Edited by Altea Ego on 01/05/2009 at 13:21
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>>People who genuinely like the automobile - enthusiasts - like carburettors, without being blind to their limitations.
>>People who merely know about the automobile, or who merely use it - car users - simply don't want to know.
Whatever you've been smoking Lud, you've had too much. I know you have a weakness for spurious generalisations, but those two ideas really take the prize.
Someone who aligns themselves with an outmoded technology for its own sake is at least seriously pretentious, and certainly blinded by their rose tinted lenses. As for being ahistrical, I think that denying the trouble and aggro caused by wretched carburettors over the years is the larger denial. I can't quite see whats so "macho" about preferring a system that just works as opposed to one which needs constant tweaking.
For our sakes - No more hashish today Lud!
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I can't quite see whats so "macho" about preferring a system that just works as opposed to one which needs constant tweaking.
It isn't the preference. It's the way it is paraded, as if it were a virtue. And as if everything leading up to the modern, throwaway jalopy were beneath contempt.
If you can bring yourself to scan my posts on this matter, you will not find any hint of 'denial' or of rose-tinted spectacles.
I am amused by the accusation that I 'align myself with outmoded technology for the sake of it'. And slightly offended by the allegation of pretentiousness. No doubt something I said somewhere has got your knickers in a bit of a twist.
Hashish isn't everyone's cup of tea but I can't help feeling something along those lines might do you a bit of good.
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New cars made for African markets (and others I'm sure) have carburettors rather than injection, I wonder how reliable they are?
If carbs are maintained they're usually up to the job, even if they're not as efficient as injection. However as long as the car drives well, who cares if the induction system is 45% efficient or 90%? Would any driver notice?
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Whilst even the latest conventional car still employs the 4 stroke suck bang blow cycle, you are so divorced from the action.
Personally, I like the minimum amount of mechanism (be it electrical or mechanical) between me and what is essentially an explosion/burn within a tube. A carburettor alows me to achieve that.
I get a buzz out being close to that and remembering that that is all that is going on to get me down the road.
I did 220 miles on Sunday on points and an SU carb. Split between the challenging Whitby moors and the equally challenging M62. At the end of that day to hear it all tick,ticking as it cooled, mixed with the smell of an old lawnmower gave me a very satisfying feeling.
My daily driver is a modern common rail diesel. Objectively much better and much more expensive but then again cars have always been subjective not objective to me. Thats why I love 'em so much.
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I wouldn`t like any of them back..
But the old floating needle SU was ok- not the one where it was held sliding against the main jet and wearing it larger.
It would be great to have a Pierberg from an 85 Polo in my hands again. I would get a five pound hammer out and give it a final, fine and intricate adjustment - against a concrete slab.
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or rust-prone box sections<<
Which reminds me of my 1st car - a twin carb 948cc Herald convertable ... I knew absolutely zilch about cars back in the early 70's and my S.U. dashpots were as dry as some of the jokes on this forum :) when I used to decelerate, it would make a noise like a formula 1 ... I used to luv it (hehe!) and I'd do it on purpose in the end.
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So ... what, I wonder - do the garage trade get up to (be very careful!) if there are no V.V or Varajet carbs, no points & condenser, no ignition timing etc., etc., etc.
My Almera seems "sealed for life", as regards to repairs, i.e. it never goes wrong!
I suppose they are mainly fitters these days who wouldn't know their king dick from their venturi :)
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"It would be great to have a Pierberg from an 85 Polo in my hands again. I would get a five pound hammer out and give it a final, fine and intricate adjustment - against a concrete slab."
Most of the Pierburgs have been replaced by Webers in VWs of that era. ii have one in my 82 Golf and it's fine. They fetch about £100 on Ebays.
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> So ... what, I wonder - do the garage trade get up to (be very careful!) if there are no V.V or Varajet carbs, no points & condenser, no ignition timing etc., etc., etc.<
'12,000 mile first service? That'll be new pads and discs all round sir - you're lucky they've lasted that long...'
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>>'12,000 mile first service? That'll be new pads and discs all round sir - you're lucky they've lasted that long...'<<
Tell me about it!!! My Almera goes in next week for a £200+ oil change as I want the book stamped.
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A discussion like this brings home what is fascinating about this forum; being able to talk and argue about things like this with people who understand and care about cars. This used to be the type of conversation you got in the works canteen, now sadly no more as people seem to know naff all about their sealed for life tin boxes other than how "Fully loaded" the thing is.
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>>My Almera seems "sealed for life", as regards to repairs, i.e. it never goes wrong!
Wait until it needs a new timing chain. ;>)
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Yeah - I know all about Almera timing chains bathtub but I keep the oil like new and listen intently upon start up from cold ... I've had it 2.5 years and its coming up to 4 years old now and I've thought of changing it but it's a damn good jamjar so I might even keep it till the end of time ... or 2012!!!
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True, thankfully the days of the "weekend head off for a decoke" are over, though I still have the valve spring compressor, colortune, dwell meter, and SPQR tappet adjuster in the garage. I would not know where to start with my 2.0 TDCI, definatly restricted to oil and filter, and air filter changes. Oh and the pollen filter! I dont miss high maintenance cars one bit, just have a high maintenance SWMBO.
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I hated carbs. When they went out of tune : up a mountain, when the weather got cold or hot or foggy.
Twin SUs/Webbers/Dellortos, Solex... all HORRIBLE.
EFI is much better.
In my first 30 years of motoring I Had to adjust carbs.. to get the cars to run properly.
In the last 15 with diesels and EFI I have done nowt..
Low maintenance cars are a MUST.
( I rebuilt a few carbs in my time... adjusting twin Webbers was fun... not... and the sound of fuel sucking in and 16mpg when pushed...
Edited by madf on 30/04/2009 at 19:17
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I hated carbs. When they went out of tune : up a mountain when the weather got cold or hot or foggy.
Good point, I had forgotten about carb icing, we once had a panda (old square one) which would ice up at a hint of cold and damp. Modern technology has some advantages.
Edited by Old Navy on 30/04/2009 at 19:40
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Modern technology has some advantages.
Many, of course, as we all know. But carburettor icing didn't happen if provision was made for warming the intake air (winter and summer settings on the air cleaner inlet, with a hose going down to the exhaust manifold, remember?).
The only time I ever experienced carb icing was in a Renault 18GTX on a motorway in very fine, very cold drizzle, when the hose to the exhaust manifold had got damaged and been removed. The car went slower and slower until I stopped in a state of some anxiety, then a minute later ran absolutely normally until the same thing happened again. I sussed it immediately and got a new bit of hose.
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Our Panda must have been Italian hot weather spec, all the induction pipework was intact. I once owned a nissan sunny that had the manual summer / winter change over flap changeover at 14 deg C, not many days in the UK when the early morning temp is that high!
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I had an Uno 999 that would ice up >65 mph in anything but a summer heatwave! Worked out the problem fairly fast after putting on carb heat in a Chipmunk as part of downwind checks in a Chipmunk thirty years ago.
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For all those saying carbs went wrong all the time, has nobody had an injection system go wrong?
I admit that's its less likely by an order of magnitude, but when it happens it's a pain to diagnose and can be costly to repair.
Lud, I had a VW 412 with the Bosch D-Jetronic injection system, it was also used on the Volvos of the same time and early Jaguar XJ-S V12. Air leaks and bad earth contacts were your worst enemy.....
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I had a 2 litre Petrol auto Maestro. The SU jet wore due to the sliding needle contact and fuel consumption dropped to 23mpg. At that point, if it fired up and you turned it off after a few seconds, or if it didn`t catch first time, or if the temperture outside didn`t suit it - it flooded.
Holding the foot down on the throttle wouldn`t clear it - taking the plugs out and heating them in the oven didn`t work either. As soon as you turned it over once they were wet through with petrol. You couldn`t tow start it of course as it was an auto.
It seemed there was a slight `dip` in the inlet manifold between the carb and the inlet valves and petrol must have pooled there.
The only fix was a brand new set of plugs and it would fire up instantly - or to leave the car standing all day with the plugs out.
The carb used to ice too when it was damp and typically just a fraction of a degree above freezing and more than once its speed fell off on the M1 with me just making it to the next junction, to pull off and wait for a few minutes to allow heat to soak through from the engine.
That was the auto petrol Maestro at 40,000 miles. My last Carb car.
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Just to add re the Maestro - `auto choke` - apt.
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My old Kawasaki ZX7R was a nightmare for carb icing. The only even half effective remedy was to put some heinously expensive fuel additive (Silkolene IIRC) in the tank which helped a bit. It had a spur off the cooling system to heat the carburettors, but it didn't do much. Someone said the little plastic filter housing in this spur might need cleaning out, which mine did, but it still did it afterwards.
Interestingly my current ZZR600 with near identical carburettors and a similar carb heating system doesn't suffer from it at all. Never had carb icing on any of my carburettor equipped cars either. In fact, I'd never heard of it until I started riding bikes.
My mate flies microlights, and he's well aware of carb icing. They are taught to "blip" the throttle constantly as they descend.
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The opposite to cold, is , well - hot, and many's the time I've gone to tune a car that is running badly - particularly when hot, only to find the carb air intake adjustment is still set in its winter position IN AUGUST :)
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I also had vapour lock due to SU mechanical fuel pumps overheating (a 1946 Rover 16).. in ambient over 25C..
Almost failed in Dartmouth tunnel. The pump was mounted on the block underneath the exhaust manifold and downpipe.. lagging did NOT help...
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"Dartmouth tunnel"
No tunnel under the Dart when I was at the College...just the Lower and Higher Ferries.
Do you mean Dartford?
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Thing is you can have a car down on puff but because its injected it has more chance of starting/running
go back to a wheezy old ford as an example and the fumes from the cranking alone would stiffle it before it had a chance to start
this is probably more the reason why i dont like carbs when what i should have said is i actually dont like worn out engines
i feel a thread coming on
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Go for it Bell boy. I can smell the Kraus Bond...;-)
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The choke/handbag story I first heard was in the seventies: Woman hires a mini at Heathrow and runs out of petrol at Stonehenge. Phones to complain about 16mpg consumption and poor performance.
Mechanic arrives to look at car, can't find anything wrong. Before she pulls away she pulls out the choke and hangs her handbag on it.
Was this an early example of the modern myth?
(I am thinking about the woman who mistook a radar trap for a lost microwave etc etc)
Hmm could be a great new thread..........
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You can't beat the look of a pair of twin choke Webers. While on the subject, don't get carried away with the belief that fuel injection gives you shed loads more power, it isn't true.
In fact a conversion to Webers on the XR3i/Astra 16V etc actually increased power output. A Caterham I once looked at also had its K Series engine converted to twin Webers.
Obviously carbs cannot compete on fuel consumption/emissions/reliability etc though.
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At last. Someone else with some idea of what they are talking about here.
'Four legs good, two legs bad!' Tchah!
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>>don't get carried away with the belief that fuel injection gives you shed loads more power, it isn't true.
As ever, there's more to it than that.
At the design stage, fuel injection will be able to be tuned to give more power *and* better economy than a carb setup.
However, once these engines fell into the hands of those who think they can modifiy it, they found that it was difficult and expensive to modify the fuel injection settings (mappings were much more difficult to load onto earlier ECUs than is the case today), and so, reverted to what they (thought they) knew about, i.e., nasty, complex, unreliable carbs.
If you compare the inlet tract of a modern fuel injection system, with either a mass air flow sensor, or a manifuld pressure sensor, there is very little disruption to airflow when compared with all the metal work in the flow in a carb - the carb cannot flow more air than the FI setup, and hence, cannot produce more power.
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(mappings were much more difficult to load onto earlier ECUs than is the case today), and so, reverted to what they (thought they) knew about, i.e., nasty, complex, unreliable carbs.
The ignorant fools! Trying to get repmobiles to go faster without having the money to modify the injection, or the time to wait ten years until the whole thing became easier! What on earth did the idiots think they were doing?
I see though NC you have been brought to acknowledge what I said ages ago, after trying to blind everyone with science to prove what utter carp carbs always were and how perfect injection is.
Go on, do a bit of kicking and screaming. It'll do you good.
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Does injection not suffer the same as carbs if it is left stood for a long time?
That's another plus point
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>>I see though NC you have been brought to acknowledge...
No - I was just indicating the shortcomings of those trying to modify the cars at the time.
Despite all of this, I would wager that most of the more complicated carbs were out of tune - or mis jetted - for a lot of the time. Like posh cameras, and posh Hi-Fi, the more settings there are, the more settings most people get horribly wrong.
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the more settings there are, the more settings most people get horribly wrong.
There at least I can agree with you up to a point. You will be aware of course that when this maladjustment wasn't just the result of wear, it had often been perpetrated by ham-fisted mechanics working for main dealers.
those trying to modify the cars at the time
Here though you are being mean-spirited and ignorant. They really did modify them in the best way available to them at the time, and really got results. But I have to say this is getting a bit tiresome. When people choose for reasons of their own to deny reality, one can only go on saying the same thing for a limited length of time. After that people have to be left to stew in their own juice. Before doing that though I will refer you to the first sentence in my first post above, which clearly states my view of injection before moving on to the quite interesting subject of carburettors.
There has been much unnecessary heat here, not essentially my doing.
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No need to get personal and nasty Lud.
I too take no pleasure from these dull exchanges.
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I like carbs on motorbikes, they seem to be better developed than car carbs. Both my current motorbikes have carbs. The first is a 21 year old MZ ETZ250, I've owned this bike for 3 years and not encountered any carb problems at all. The other bike is a 5 year old Suzuki 1200 Bandit with a bank of 4 CV carbs - again no problems at all, the bike starts and runs perfectly. Suzuki relaunched the Bandit as a 1250 with a new engine and injection a couple of years ago. This later injected bike is no more economical than my bike and has less range because the fuel pump is located in the fuel tank ( 1 litre less capacity).
As an aside, I find the 'enriched starting circuit' of the MZ carb to be particularly useful for providing an instant toxic 2-stroke smokescreen, makes tailgating car/van drivers back off every time!
I don't think I would buy a car with a carburetter, the last one I did own with one was a '78 Fiat 127, the auto choke did not work and this meant I had to lift the airbox and spin the butterfly choke into position just to start it.
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Allegro3 1.1:
SU carb - agree about the slurping noise, memories :-)
MkII Cavalier 1.6:
GM Varajet with auto choke - awful
GM Varajet with manual choke conversion - still awful
Weber carb conversion - much better, then I crashed it
MkIV Cortina 2.0 auto:
Original carb - 9mpg (literally- Hitchin to Enfield and back on a whole tank)
Replacement carb (from scrappy) - still 9mpg
Sold the car after 2 weeks.
Edited by Dave_TD {P} on 03/05/2009 at 00:29
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Chrome - the old Triumph 900 triple used to start and run perfectly. Then they brought out the 955i engine - still starts and runs perfectly but mpg increased from 35ish to 50ish.
(And more power and torque than a Bandit :). )
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The first couple of generations of injected bikes used to suffer from awful snatchy, almost "kangaroo like" response to small throttle openings when rolling back on from a closed throttle, particularly in the lower gears. A friend has a Suzuki TL1000S which is near impossible to ride smoothly around town without a lot of clutch slip or clutch disengagement/re-engagement that you wouldn't even think about on a carb fed bike.
It's something that Suzuki at least only properly fixed on any of their bikes in the last couple of years if the magazine reviews are to be believed.
Edited by DP on 03/05/2009 at 13:31
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My last bike, a Suzuki GSX 750 Inazuma (Not many about, think Bandit only better looking) had carbs. I bought it new in Jan 2000 and ran it for over five years, silky smooth, 55mpg, never went out of balance or iced up.
The only fault was that the choke cable broke after about 18 months and I never bothered to replace it. Cold start procedure involved holding the clutch in with my left hand, right hand operating the choke mechanism at the carbs and right knee up to prod the starter button. I did once try bending down and nudging the start button with my nose, but no matter how smooth modern bike feel when you are riding them, "Some vibration is apparant" if you know where to look.
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madux - Triumph are the masters of fuel injection right? I remember the TT600 mess! That was one unrideable bike, the lucky customers became unpaid development riders for Triumph!
The fact that they could not get the 900 T engine to return more than 35mpg ticks the 'could do better box'.
50'ish - that is what my Bandit returns, an improvement by Triumph then.
More power and torque - well yes, but was also about £2k more to purchase as well, plus it is in a higher insurance group. The Bandit is hardly outclassed by the 955 Speed Triple in real world road conditions, plus it has the benefit of being easy to DIY service maintain and spares / replacement parts are cheap and plentiful. ')
Edited by Chrome on 03/05/2009 at 17:22
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