Hi guys, Now that my Dino is undergoing a bare metal respray, I've got some time to plan ahead. Once she's back, I'll still have the issues with my webers, and quite frankly, I'm pretty fed up with them. As nice as they may be, the Weber to me seems like the epitomy of a concept taken a few steps too far. The idea of a carb is simple: create a vacuum and let that suck in some fuel. The problems come when you start raising the bar on the quality of the fuel mixture. Then you need to add a second stage, progression hole, air corrector tubes, a choke which is sort of a mini carb in itself, etc etc. Long story short: I'm seriously considering parting with the Webers and putting in EFI. Of course, we've all seen the TWM throttle bodies. NICE! But quite expensive too. Each TB costs around $450, and a complete set will set you back a whopping $3215! And that excludes ECU, fuel pump, fuel lines and whatever odds and ends one would need. These combined could add another $1500 to the tab, keeping the price tag just south of the $5K mark!! That's a lot of money. Anyone know of an alternative to the TWM's? I want to stay with individial TB's and not go with a CIS type central manifold. Of course, I could go the MK E route and manifacture something myself out of 8 Ducati TB's and a pile of aluminium shavings, but is there something else on the market that is a drop-in replacement for the DNCF's? Thanks! Hans
I would really think about this twice. You will soon see that I'm a big fan of carburetors but the basic concept of this post is that changing to EFI on car designed to use carburetors is absurd. I do not know what your issue is but I know that a knowledgeable mechanic will be able to sort it permanently. Some times the issue is elsewhere and the carburetors are only revealing something that is hidden below. I do know that a well tuned carburetor setup will outperform in top power and torque anything other than super specific, mega expensive full programmable setups such as those from Pectel or Motec. Carbs cannot reach the driveability of EFI but can surley approach it. In short try to sort out your setup with the help of an experienced mechanic and avoid the bastardization of the car. Just my 2c.
I've had specialist look at the car and got it back running worse than when I brought it in. So he looked at it again, still at no avail. I ended up working on it myself to get it running anywhere near decent. Then a year later, a guy from a company that does nothing but working on carbed cars, with a specialization with webers, has worked on it. Again, it came back worse than when I brought it in. Again, I had to spend several hours to get fuel consumption below 12 mpg and the smell confined to within three blocks around the car. I've had it with these jokers! I hear you on bastardizing the car. To put you at ease on that, I am thinking of doing something that is reversible. TB's that are a direct replacement of the Webers and could at a later date be swapped back to Webers if so desired. And yes, I'd be doing one fo the fully programmable ECU's that you are mentioning. A ViPEC V88 in my case. I'm working with these on my aircraft and simply love them. And contrary to carbs, you can set fuel delivery very specific for all rpm's and throttle positions. And if one does not change anything to path the air has to travel, the engine will definately not produce any less power. Nor will it sound different. It would just drive better. No more need to "drive around" the known weak spots in the power curve of the weber-fed car. I'm really on the fence on this one though. One could argue that the obvious flaws of the Webers are in fact character, and I could go along with that reasoning most of the way. It's just that I would like to put an end to the misery that I have with them... Hans
You will spend a lot more money for uncertain results whereas you would spend 1000 max. to get your carbs sorted by a true professional.
FWIW, my carbs (both ours are '74's) are set up perfectly and have been a non-issue for me. When I bought the car, the shop that did the PPI synched them and had them set a little rich. After a year of running on the rich side, I brought them to a local shop and they rebuilt them when I noticed a slight leak at the base of one. They have been rock solid since and I drive regularly. I'd have to believe that someone out there can get these babies set up for you and you won't have any more issues. Good luck! JIM
I wouldn't recommend any place I haven't been to but have heard of. The only places I know are in Switzerland. If that's not an issue let me know and I'll PM you.
Well, for starters I'd need to buy myself one new carb, as some grease monkey who has worked on it in the past had twisted one of the idle adjustment screws in at an angle. Result is that that one is now totally off. I ended up having to run one size bigger idle jet in that one in order to get acceptable running (not too lean on that cylinder and not too rich on the rest of them). Are these four carbs a matched set, or can one get a unit that will match? I'm mostly thinking size and location of progression holes here...
I briefly contemplated this idea for my 365 gt4/bb. Other than spending a whole lot of money...and going into a world of new problems and unchartered water, there's no reason why a set of DCNF's can't be set to run correctly and with reasonable fuel economy. There are many folks on the board who have had great successes with Webers on their V-8 powered cars. See posts by: JimShadow, Russ (snj5), Dandy_Don, etc. FWIW, I had a 246 Dino way back...and she ran ever so sweet with Webers. FWIW(2): The "trick" to setting up Webers on any car is getting the linkage adjusted correctly. Until that issue is resolved, trying to adjust the carbs is a total waste of time. Search and read my most recent posts to Dandy_Don, who had problems I suspect are similar to what you're experiencing. Find another specialist...or send your car up to New England. Best, David
You can buy a 40 DCNF and jet it to match maybe your existing one can be rebuilt/repaired. I'll PM you.
Boy Chris, those manifolds sure do look sweet. Hmm, a set of those on my BB might just wake her up a bit. (Never mind that they'd give me even a bigger margin of win when I dust that Wanker from Canada into the weeds...)Then again, I don't know what I'd do with all the spare time on my hands if I didn't have to "fiddle" with the Webers! LOL!!! David
Hello Hans. I feel our pain. I went the TWM route with my 308 GTS euro. My main complaint with the webers is that they did not compensate for altitude changes here in the rockies, or temperature changes. With the fuel injection system and electromotive setup I have unlimited programmability almost too much. I picked up almost 10% increase in power and lost no torque these things can breathe. I am still sorting out issues, I need to route vacuum lines off each manifold for a good MAP signal this is critical and must be done with individual throttle bodies for driveability and economy. I dont know of any alternative to the TWM system that will prove effective and no headaches. Yes, they are expensive, the whole conversion is expensive and time consuming I have over 400 hours in the conversion, and will have way more hours when I finally get things sorted out. If I were you, I would look for a brand new set of webers for your car, it may cost $2500, but I have over $9000 in my setup (TWM, ECU, direct fire distributor, hi pressure fuel pump and lines, injectors, all the sensors and wires, and all the machine work) and I did all the work (except for maching parts), and still not done after almost 2 years. The car does run great and just went on a 6 hour trouble free drive thru Colorado recently. Trying to match the one carb will be difficult not only orientation wise, but progression hole wise they are different for different years and euro/us spec etc. Once I sort out the MAP signal issues with vacuum, then I can fully comment on the conversion and driveability. I am happy I did the mod, I learned a lot and am still learning. The system has great potential. The car sounds even better than with webers less restriction in the throats. I also installed the innovate wide band O2 sensor and digital A/F guage in the car for feedback purposes which I feel is very necessary for tuning. Hope this helps . John oh yeah, you wil be fiddling with this system a whole lot more than if you had carbs - believe me..... Image Unavailable, Please Login
I am in LOVE! It would be hard to tell you didn't have Webbers under your airbox. Whose setup it that? Maybe someday. I put a custom built EFI on my 1961 Corvette and would never go back to a carb. A lot of the reason has to do with the gasoline these days vs old style gas, lower boiling points and heat soak can make for a flooded engine after sitting shut off for a few minutes. Plus the ability to tailor your ignition curve and A/F ratio exactly to your motor. Doug
What are two two corrugated hoses on the left? Do you have a pic showing your coil/distributor system? Crank or flywheel trigger? Getting used to how to deal with the fuel and timing tables took me more than a few hours, but once you learn and get used to them, they are simple. Some ECUs have individual cylinder fuel trim, also, for real fine tuning. A few hours on the dyno was eye opening with regard to ignition timing optimization, found out I didn't need a curve, the final timing map looked more like a (very tame) roller coaster with some peaks and valleys, as the motor liked more timing at certain places than others; you could never do that with a centrifugal advance system Thanks, Doug
I might be! Do you have them anywhere near, by any chance? And if so, could you please count the number of progression holes in the throat (there are a bunch of tiny little holes at the side of the throat, pretty much where the butterfly valve sits). I'd have to match my own progression holes, or tuning them properly will be pretty much impossible... Thanks! Hans
Thats it though the results are certain. The car will run perfectly at all rpm and in all weather and it will make more hp as a bonus. There simply is no comparison what so ever between. Carburetors are for lawnmowers and other low cost/low performance applications That said, I agree with you that the car should run fine with the webers on it and whatever is wrong should be able to be sorted out. The car ran fine when it was new, it should run now .but that might very well mean 4 new carbs. Now as far as doing it the only think I know of that is pretty much a bolt-on is the TWM set-up. The next closest would be to gut the webers and add injectors to them. The next option is to adapt motorcycle TBs to the stock manifold which isnt too bad. Last would be a custom intake to hold something like motorcycle TBs. The harder part is often the trigger and sensors but that is pretty straight forward, it just take some time to do.
Doug, My electromotive timing settings are pretty linear to a total of I think - 40 degrees at 3800 rpm, then levels off. I would be interested in seeing your timing numbers across the rpm range. I do agree timing is a big player, might be tough to really test on a dyno because no fresh air is moving into the intake unless they have a setup for blowing cool air into the scoop. i have the crank tirggered electromotive system - my old electromotive system (hpv-1) worked flawlessley for 10 years until i traded it in to electromotive for the new system. Those extra hoses to the air cleaner on the drivers side motor is for mo air from the drivers side oil cooler scoop. I have a thread on it. Fantastic mod, now you can hear the intake from the drivers seat like the passenger gets to hear, and brings in much needed air at the higher rpms. I just used 90 degree pvc elbows pointed in the direction of the airflow in the oil cooler scoop, and clamped a hose to them. Then welded muffler pipe to the airbox was the right size exactly. .. Gobs of air still get to the oil cooler btw. Whos the guy on fchat that is using motorcycle throttle bodies on the 308???? It looks doable, cost effective a lot of work to do this also.
On my Chev V8, we found that timing peaked at ~33 degrees about 3200 RPM, then we needed to back off about 2-3 degrees from 3400 to about 4800, then we were able to raise it back to 33 degrees over 5000 RPM. Dropping it back was worth 10 ft-lb TQ in that RPM range (7 liter motor). Or another way to put it would be we found more Tq in the 2600-3200 RPM range than if we maxed at straight 30 degrees at 4000 RPM I would assume other motors may find a few HP here and there with microtuning. I use a dyno shop that tunes ricers and Porsches for club racing, they are pretty on top of motor tweaking. Doug
Hans, this is my first post, and I'm a newbie and a rookie or whatever you call it, but it seems to me (from your previous posts) that you're are very capable with engines and motors...if you have this problem with the webers it's very discouraging for a beginner like me, who's saving to buy a carbureted 308 and hoping he could do some garage work himself! You're breaking my dream! By the way, if you're willing to go to Switzerland fot the weber tuning, why not go down a little more and come here to Michelotto in Padova?
