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- Path: sparky!uunet!spool.mu.edu!sdd.hp.com!ux1.cso.uiuc.edu!news.cso.uiuc.edu!ux4.cso.uiuc.edu!mchaffee
- From: mchaffee@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu (Real Life?!?! HA!!)
- Subject: Re: MG carb question
- References: <hellmann.728021357@sycamore.cs.scarolina.edu>
- Message-ID: <C1GB4M.3Ln@news.cso.uiuc.edu>
- Sender: usenet@news.cso.uiuc.edu (Net Noise owner)
- Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
- Distribution: rec.autos.tech
- Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 07:50:46 GMT
- Lines: 55
-
- hellmann@cs.scarolina.edu (Doug Hellmann), though his/her name field con-
- flicts with his/her signature, writes:
-
- >I am about to come into possession of a 1974 MGB. I understand they
- >have some sort of dual side draft carb on them. Can anyone give me an
- >opinion on how hard these are to tune to each other? I can rebuild any
- >Holley you put in front of me, but I was sort of intimidated by this MG
- >carb.
-
- >Any thoughts would be appreciated
-
- From the proud (and at times cranky and bleeding) owner of a 1974 MG Midget,
- here's what to expect:
- The mixture, through those funny pot things, varies infinitely by
- manifold vacuum and airflow.
- Therefore, to change the mixture curve, you must change the metering
- needle.
- There is *only* *one* jet! This came as something of a relief to me,
- having spent God-knows-how-much time adjusting the jets on the twin
- Solexes of a BMW.
- The only adjustments that can be made without major work are idle
- speed and overall mixture.
-
- Overall, the SU's are a little more prone to air leaks than lesser carbs, and
- adjustment can prove a divergent process, so don't screw with it too much.
-
- Balancing the two carbs to one another is pretty easy; you can buy, for a
- relatively small sum, a tool that measures airflow at each carb intake. As-
- suming uniform compression, the airflow at idle should be the same. When the
- engine is off idle, you will learn to tell the symptoms of out-of-sync carbs
- pretty damn fast. It runs wrong, but in a distinct manner.
-
- You should join the British cars mailing list by sending mail to:
- british-cars-request@autox.team.net. They're most helpful. Also, call Vic-
- toria British Motors at 1-800-255-0088. They are most helpful and have largely
- good parts prices.
-
- Overall, though the SU's are funky compared to "real" carburetors (ho ho ho,
- guess which existed first?) they work pretty well once adjusted, and once ad-
- justed tend to STAY adjusted (unlike certain damn German carbs....)
-
- But if the SU's are just too much, the consensus seems to be that you will get
- better performance out of a big Weber or two; the conversion is a little out
- of this college student's budget at about US$500.
-
- Feel free to email me with questions.
-
- Cheers!
- ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
- Michael T. Chaffee | mchaffee@ux4.cso.uiuc.edu | ______
- "It has been said - mostly by illiterates and conserv-| \ / HATE
- atives - that the belief in God is at the base of the | \ / is not a
- American system, and that the United States is a prod-| \/ FAMILY VALUE
- uct of Christian piety." - Leonard Peikoff |
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