Thread: holly carb

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my 17 year old just bought a 67 chevelle, it was used as a dragster, the battery is in the trunk with a kill switch. it has a chevy 350 with a holly carb, and we live in new england..we cannot keep the car running in cold weather..we are going to move the battery back up front and take off the electronic fuel pump and put back on a mechanical fuel pump, and it needs the throttle cable positioning fixed..but first we gotta get that holly carb off, and put on a carb that will run in cold weather..i was told to get an edelbrock, they will run in any weather..big problem, my husband owns a repair garage, and shame on him, but he wants nothing to do with this car..so my son and i are in this on our own.
i just want to hear from experienced car people on the carb, and what other suggestions you can give me...this car runs great when the weather is above 45..it has new duel exhaust, and man does it sound good. thanks for any suggestions you can give us.

Originally posted by elliecook55
my 17 year old just bought a 67 chevelle, it was used as a dragster, the battery is in the trunk with a kill switch. it has a chevy 350 with a holly carb, and we live in new england..we cannot keep the car running in cold weather..we are going to move the battery back up front and take off the electronic fuel pump and put back on a mechanical fuel pump, and it needs the throttle cable positioning fixed..but first we gotta get that holly carb off, and put on a carb that will run in cold weather..i was told to get an edelbrock, they will run in any weather..big problem, my husband owns a repair garage, and shame on him, but he wants nothing to do with this car..so my son and i are in this on our own.
i just want to hear from experienced car people on the carb, and what other suggestions you can give me...this car runs great when the weather is above 45..it has new duel exhaust, and man does it sound good. thanks for any suggestions you can give us.

sound like to me you have a choke problem. if the choke is not set right, no carb. will start and run like it should in cold weather. do you know if there is a choke on it or not?

Originally posted by DennyW
Better yet, take a camera, go out and pull the air cleaner off, and take a picture of what you have so we can see it.

you getting where you cant work on a car with out a pic.

Originally posted by DennyW
Well, for all I know, they may not even have a choke plate on it.

i dont think it does.

It is likely too big a cfm carb. what works good in the summer on a racetrack aint worth a hoot in subzero. For the street u could get lots of power with no bigger than a 500 cfm carb. And it would start and run every time. Also even tho I dont have much use for holley carbs it probably dont have as much to do with the brand as the mis application. Ives rdhotfrd

it does not have a choke, that is one of the problems we are intending to fix, we pull off the air cleaner and make sure the butterfly is open and just go from there..but it still does not like to stay running at idle

Originally posted by elliecook55
it does not have a choke, that is one of the problems we are intending to fix, we pull off the air cleaner and make sure the butterfly is open and just go from there..but it still does not like to stay running at idle

without a choke its not going to run like you wont it to, until it warms up, then you dont need the chole any more. so if you can get the choke working on the holly you can save yourself the cost off a new carb.

we intend to put a manual choke to the dash, that might help in keeping it going.

Originally posted by elliecook55
we intend to put a manual choke to the dash, that might help in keeping it going.

that should fix your cold running problem.

Stick with that Holley, it'll perform circles around an Edelbrock (Carter AFB or QuadraJet whichever carb Edelbrock is now calling by their own name?). You can fit it with manual choke like you said you were going to do and all your starting problems will be solved.

Many of the old pickups (I mean pre-1970) had manual chokes regardless of the engine. They wouldn't start in the winter here either (Oklahoma) unless you used the choke. Manual chokes were just an accepted fact of life for a pickup back then. Using one on a hot engine with a big Holley is no different, and it's certainly not a good reason to swap for a lesser carb.

I've used, and am using all three kinds of carbs on smallblock Chevy engines (Q-Jets, AFBs, and Holleys) and I'll take a Holley hands down to the rest of them. When you punch the throttle with a Holley, especially a double-pumper, you get immediate response that you can feel in the seat of your pants. The other carbs don't do that quite as convincingly.

Put that manual choke on, get used to using it, and enjoy that big Holley, your engine will thank you with it's response.

Randy

well, thank you four honesty, that will be the first thing we do.

First of all, You dont really need a choke i found out quickly in cold weather, if your timing is set correctly and you pump the hell out of it it will start, Weather or not it will start running while its cold is a different story, Definatly stay with the holly and you can even hold the choke plate shut and have someone turn it over to get it to run. I have a mouse and i couldnt get it to consistantly run well in the cold either, till i set the timming correctly. If your son has a chevelle and your having problems with it. go buy some newer EFI car of some sort untill you can get it to run right or untill you can get your husband to help you with it becouse you cant really get all the pointers you need offline However you can go to the local auto parts store and pick up a Holly tuner carb hanes manual that will help tons.

Since this is a "dragster" and built to run hard is it possibe it has a aftermarket intake that does not have a port to allow exhaust gases to heat up the vaporized fuel. In cold weather the carb may be icing up.