A pic of why my carburetor failed

[03mach1]

Well my T- Bird broke down twice in the past three weeks and I finally found out why it cuts out and dies and I have a pic of what caused it and here it is. See the slits in it. Those slits are letting the float absorb fuel and causing the float to sink and flood the motor with way to much fuel. I checked my filter at where the carb meets the fuel line and it was clean as new. So it is defective. I emailed Holley but have not been emailed back. The carb is only 5 months old and this happens. The car was very limited on driving. so the carb was used maybe once every other week or two weeks. What should I do. I have already bought replacement parts but I would like for Holley to give me a new carb b/c this one is defective. I like Holley but I could not imagine this happening to a new carb. I bought the carb from summit which I think is the best place to buy performance parts but they will not take it back as a defective carb.

[CharlesW]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Any chance you are using E-10 Ethanol blended fuel?
It can really do a number on some plastics.
It would seem that a carburetor purchased recently would be constructed to withstand the effects of the ethanol, but who knows.

[Markus Kleis]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

In California we have nothing BUT 10% ethanol... junk fuel!

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

The carb is designed as a replacement carb for my thunderbird. I do run Marvels mystery oil through the carb but that should not do any damage to the carb because it is designed to run on lead additive gas. I would call Holley but I think that will not help b/c they will tell me to go through all these different depatments at there HQ and go no where with the issue. My teacher says they should replace it. Ethonol has no cleaning properties or stuff in it that would do this ithink I would have to do some research. The replacement parts are brass floats so they will not break. Oh and that is not plastic. it is compressed composite paper with a clear sealent sprayed on it that prevent the gas to get absorbed. That is why it started to absorb fuel because the scratches in it take the clear seal off. This float is supposed to be very light weight but it weighs as much as a quarter. Not sure what caused this. I bet holley would like to see what happened but they have not responded back to me yet.

[CharlesW]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

The usual damage I have seen from E-10 has been more of a softening, almost melted appearance of the plastic parts. It sometimes looks like the part had been subjected to intense heat.
The damage you have looks like the material has dried out and failed. Ethanol would probably contribute to that as well.
The fact that the replacements are made of a different material seems to indicate that they may have experienced some problems with the original floats. Why else would they change?

Fortunately for me, we can still get non alcohol fuel here and I don't use the E-10 at all.

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

the motor does run warm. I do run 91 octane. It has a big block and I know big blocks need to breathe or damage will start to happen. I can get 110 octane in my area but it costs like 10 bucks a gallon and it has lead in it because it is dirt bike racing fuel for four stroke motors. Hopefully the brass floats will do the trick. I hate this gas for new cars.

[roushstage2]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Just to note: a lot more gasoline has ethanol in it than you think. Gas stations are not required to put the sticker on the pump.

Anyways, I highly doubt the gas caused that. Seems like a mfr. defect of sorts. I like Edelbrock, just can't bring myself to use Holley. What is Holley's warranty on that? That is usually what Summit would go by...

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Summit had a 90 day warrenty. which in 3 months it almost met the warrenty cut off. If it is defective they should replace it anyways. I am never going to buy another holley again.

[Paul S]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Worked in a carb shop of a friend for years. Found floats like that quite often.Old rochester Q-jets were the most common with holley a distant second.We always replaced with another black composite typefloat and very rarely had a second failure.Carb manufacturer just got some bad floats from a vendor would have been my guess. On a side note it was strange that the first time we took a hammer to a defective float we were shocked on how much gas they can hold.

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Yeah the float weighed at least as much as a quarter. The good news today I got the car running perfectly. I pulled the secondaires bowl out and the same thing with that float as the primary bowl fine slits in the float and it absorbed gas. I put the new brass floats in and the car is as smooth as butter. no lopeing at all at idle. The car did not shake one bit on reving. I replaced all the gaskets just for the heck of it to insure no leaks. I am very happy that I and my Teacher got the car running great. Those brass floats will last a very long time. I am going to call Holley and tell them to start using brass ones again because it will make their company look better to see that they do not fail.

[J. A. Michaels]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

I am glad you got the T-bird running again. Those brass floats should last you a very long time.

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

I want to drive it again now really badly. I am picking it up tommorow from the shop and driveing it home.

[03mach1]

Re: A pic of why my carburetor failed

Well I have another problem, my throttle gets stuck. i was drving it and it would not shift to high gear 3rd. I finally got it to shift and i was going i would say 45 MPH and I barely touched the pedal and I mean barely the car down shifted to low gear and I freaked out. no damage thank god. I am trying to diagnose why it wont shift and why the pedal gets stuck.