ryanc

first, I do not claim to know anything about anything. if you think i'm wrong, i probably am.

I had problems with my stock q-jet carb. people kept telling me they were junk. i wanted to replace the carb. someone told me to get a 750 cfm carb. i now know that was the wrong choice. i have a edelbrock performer 750 cfm carb on it now (yeah we got it installed before I found out it was a bad idea) with a new intake and i am going to be switching to a performer 600 cfm carb. and then I was informed tonight that I need to replace my distributor because the current one is electronically controlled and since i swapped carbs, the distributor needs to have a vacuum connection for advancing the timing.

i need to go as cheap as possible since I'm already over $500 in on this project and it looks like i'll only get about $200 back or so for my one-day-old 750 cfm carb on ebay.

So now, having that said, can someone please tell me what I need to buy from summitracing.com to get my car running. the whole thing makes me want to vomit. i already have the 600 cfm carb in my cart, and that 's where i'm at. please advise. thank you.

ryan

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

You are going to need a distributor with a vacuum advance. I believe the spark advance on the Q Jets was controlled by the computer as well as the TBI and TPI motors.

If you are on the cheap, like I was, you can opt for a Pro Comp distributor on ebay for just under $50. HEI, vacuum advance, no complaints here so far, and they look great. Either that or get a summit brand one or a jegs brand one for around $100-$150.

Eh but don't fret about selling the 750. I am actually in the identical boat right now. I had one on the car for 2 weeks or so, and ran the car a handful of times to try and tune it, but then figured out it was completely the wrong carburetor for me. I opted for a 750 holley and that is doing wonders for me right now. I contemplated returning it to jegs, but theres signs of wear (i.e. the lock washers have dug into the base, smells like gasoline). If yours wasnt put on the car, I'd return it to the place you bought it from. Jegs has a 1 year return policy, and I think summit has something similar.

ryanc

Thanks for the info...

Is this all I would need: Mallory 85 Series HEI Distributor? It says the coil is sold separately, so what do I need to buy for that? Sorry I'm clueless... never had to mess with this stuff before.

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

It's an 'in cap coil'. It should be included inside the distributor. It is that flat piece sticking off up top. Don't know why they say it is sold separately though.

That would do though.

ryanc

I went ahead and ordered the distributor. The one I sent the link to did not come with a coil so I found the same model that comes with a coil (only like $15 more or so). I did not order the 600 cfm carb because the guy that told me to get the 750 is confident he'll be able to get everything working well from my 750. The only thing I'm worried about is gas mileage, but we'll see how that goes once everything is up and running. If it's too bad, I'll go for the 600 and sell the 750

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

750 is a looooot of carb for a 305. What is the product number for the carb? 1411, 1407? The 1411 is the leaner of the two and might work. That is what I had for my 350 motor with aluminum heads and big cam, and I straight out could not richen it up enough to get it to run right. Still lean on the richest setting. (I had the 1411, and it is rated for straight up economy, so for my application it just wasn't cutting it....i found this out later)

A buddy of mine ran a 600cfm (performance calibrated) on his 350 chevelle with a combo similar to mine and it was fine. The 600 would be perfect for you. Mind you, he got a 650 Demon (comparable to a 750 holley) and his gains were pretty decent.

scottyb123

hey i was in the same boat you were about a month ago...my qjet was shot and i had to go out and buy a carb...i bought the 1406 edelbrock carb....it mounted up PERFECTLY and was a breeze to install. i had to buy a $10 egr block off plate at napa because the 1406 isnt technically street legal. i did not buy a new distributor, i have the stock dist. with no vacuum advance and everything works great, no performance loss. in my opinion, the 1406 is basically a stock replacement bolt-on, its the easiest way to go. you get quite a bit better torque and acceleration off the line, and it bumped my mpg up 1 mpg. i would suggest this by far.

ryanc

I have the 1411 on it now. I had taken it off to sell it on ebay, but then i put it back on tonight. I messed with the idle mixture screws but didn't really set them properly by the book. I did mess with my high idle screw and got my high idle down to 1500 rpm as it should be. it was at 2500 rpm and i'm assuming that was because the carb is made for a bigger engine. the car runs fairly nicely at idle. the timing is a little off though. we'll see what we can do once the new distributor comes in and hopefully it'll be what I need to get things gonig. I can always change it later...

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

Dude you are going to want to get a vacuum advance distributor. I think you'd be surprised at the amount of power you are missing out on.

ryanc

When is a ballast resistor needed? My neighbor mentioned something about getting one for my car. Is this needed?

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

Um, arent those for points type ignitions? You wont need one if you go with the vacuum advance HEI

Rebuildman

What did you do with the old Q-Jet? Was this a CCC? (computer controlled).
Actually the Q-Jets are good carbs, but they are harder to repair/tune if you are not familiar with them. But once they are dialed in they work great.

Mikz86TA

iTrader: (4)

Back when I still was rockin the 305, I had swapped the Computer Controlled Q-Jet for a older Non-CC Q-Jet. Since the car had a 7-pin module HEI dist(the one without vaccum adv.) I opted to get a vaccum advance dist. I got one from Summit for a reasonable price. If you are looking for a rebuilt one or a reman, get one for a 85-87 305 C/K (full size chevy/gmc truck). They are an identical plug-in distributir as you original but with a vaccum advance pot on it. Be sure to connect the dist. vaccum line to a 'ported' vaccum outlet on the carb. A common mistake which will cause a good deal of issues. If you want to get some performance out of it, CraneCams sells an adjustable vaccum pot for them and most Ignition companies sell the internal dwell modules(5-pin) and coils that drop in. Rebuild man is right too. The Q-jet is a good carb. I used to rebuild them on the side for many applications and has flawless results. I had a list of tricks and upgrades plus am a very throurough person at details. The design is great for economy when at cruise and power when opened up. Proper tuning is really easy and also key to the Q-jet performing well. They can be a pain to pull apart and put back together. But all in all a good carb design.

ryanc

the old carb is sitting in my brother's shop. I think it is the computer controlled one but I'm not sure. I know there were a decent number of wires that connected to it... i was going to try to sell it on ebay if i can get any money for it. same with the old intake manifold. i'm also going to try to sell the old distributor as well - it still works great, but just not with my application.

GuitarJunki17

iTrader: (1)

Its CC if it's got sensors and wires coming off of it

five7kid

iTrader: (14)

You've gotten so much bad advice it's hard to know where to start to pick up the pieces. Vomiting is appropriate.

Forget Performer carbs. They're about as worthless as you can get. They're cheap for a reason. A q-jet has limitations, but the Performer has all the limitations the q-jet has, and goes downhill from there.

Hopefully you haven't cut any wires.

Go to your brother's shop and get the carb and whatever other parts you took off. Most likely the new intake manifold is fine (provided it is made for both spreadbore and squarebore mount carbs - most likely it is).

Have or rebuild the q-jet with a kit and good dip-type carb cleaner, blow out all of the passages with compressed air, get an electronic q-jet tool kit (~$10), set the thing up right.

Most likely whatever problems you were having had nothing to do with the carb, or were easily remedied.

ryanc

I'm going to stick with what I've purchased right now (since I can't return it anyway). My carb has never ever worked right since the car has been mine (8 years). Choke problems, idle problems, throttle sticking problems. It was rebuilt once or twice when it was my mom's car. If I can get everything running well, that is my main goal. Power is nice, fuel economy is nice, but running well is most important. And not spending any more money is important too...

Thanks for everyone's help!

Ozz1967

iTrader: (4)

I have to agree with five7kid....you got some really bum advice.

The Qjet is actually a really good carb. Harder than nuts to tune, but you get mileage AND power from it due to how the primaries and secondaries are set up.

Silver87

I agree too. I almost was led to replace my electronic quadrajet, but decided against it. Got some good advice from peoploe here and solved my Q-Jet problems. It is the way to go. ECM manages the fuel mixture and timing so it maximizes fuel economy. I just got 270 miles on my first tank of gas since I tuned it. Thats somewhere around 23 MPG! I still think I'm a little on the rich side but that's better than what I expected.
I wish I could have found a tool kit for this carb, although I was able to make my adjustments with the top of the carb off and then bolt back together after I was done. Where do you get the tool kit to reach down to the lean/rich stop screws?

five7kid

iTrader: (14)

I picked up the adjustment tool kit from Checker. I believe it is listed on partsamerica.com.

slim84maro

i ran an edelbrock performer 600cfm manual choke on my 84 305 bored .030 over with performer cam and intake and kept the dizzy that didnt have a vaccum on it and it worked great. dont buy a mallory dizzy they just suck all of their electronic stuff does. i know this because my friend drove an arca or a late model car and they had to run mallory for a race and everyones stuff kept messing up. i bought a mallory dizzy with a coil on the cap and later found that the coil only went to 5500 rpms and i needed the 7000rpm one.

the othewr day i just unplugged 2 wires from my carb on my 83 camaro. the choke and something that was ont the front of the carb. i unplugged it because i was hearing a ticing noise when i pluged in my battery and with the wire off it doesnt tic. i also took off some hoses from the carb. one on the front and now it makes and loud sucking noise and the engine idles high but when i put my finger over it the idles normal. any1 know what i unhooked? o yea im also going to put on my 600cfm edel carb with intake and leave same dizzy. emissions is over for this car so im taking that power robbing crap off. o yea i took off some hoses from my exhaust too. now it sucks air in from the holes on the exhaust. i dont know what im doing but im doing it. any insight?

five7kid

iTrader: (14)

Okay, let's get some things straight.

Hook up the wires and hoses you disconnected. You didn't help anything, and you did make things worse. The choke needs power so that it opens up when the engine is warm (unless you tied the choke open somehow). With the choke wire disconnected, you're going to have a partially open choke, killing power and economy.

The other wire runs the mixture control solenoid. It is supposed to tick. Without it connected, you're running full rich all the time - you'll foul your plugs, which will eventually kill power, and you're killing economy now.

The big hose at the front of the carb goes to the PCV valve and vapor canister. Hook it back up immediately.

You haven't helped your car by the hacking you've done. Understand what things do before you start haphazardly disconnecting stuff. It isn't "power robbing crap" like you seem to think.

Don't run a Performer (or any non-computer controlled carb) with a stock computer controlled distributor. If you need that explained, I suppose we can go through it again.

slim84maro

ok. but i just found a vaccum controled dizzy in my parts room so that should work, and the stock manifold and q-jet is going i hate it. my old performer carb that i took all the butterfly valves off ran awsome. putting that back on with a performer intake. i will see what happens with the stock dizzy but i do have a vaccum one ready to put on. now the pvc canister is going along with the rest of the emsisson stuff.. i want fresh air in the motor. i will substatute with a breather. the thing on the passanger side of the intake sucks and itsgetting blocked now i hate it. block off plate! i appreciate the info because i know i dont know everything but im kind of hard headed. so thanks for helping anyways.

Saigon_Bob

iTrader: (2)

i just browsed thru the posts really quickly... im not a fan of the quadra bog... but when it's running right it does rock ( we used em to dyno on the T-buckets at school ).

Im in the way too big carb situation too... i had to convert to carb on my TBI 305 because of a few reasons but all i had laying around was an open plenum manifol and a street demon 750....


first of all i know this isnt the way to go for the street and yes it sucks performance wise and gas milage.

my first camaro was 305 carb'd with a edelbroke 600 or something close to that and it ran way better when the stupid thing wasnt sticking open, shut, accel pump not jamming, etc... sigh i really hated that carb.

in reality the 750 was meant for my cammed out 357... its too much carb for that too but i wanted room to "grow" in case of boost or squeeze.
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Hell yea hook it back up... for that whole argument on "do i need a pcv??"" Well the short answer is yes .... with out it you'll have tons of crankcase pressure and oil leaks... its horrible... **** my car was so bad without the PCV the oil pressure would go down to 0 while driving....

Saigon_Bob

iTrader: (2)

the holes in the exhaust are you smog pump holes.... all your doing is tricking your car into thinking its running lean.

The PCV needs to be there... if all you run is a breather you better park your car on a cardboard... it will leak.

The EGR you are blocking off isn't hurting performance... it works only under cruise conditions and it actually cools the cylinders off reducing the chance for knocking.... the ONLY way it could hurt you is if its stuck open at idle... and that'll just make the car run rough.

The canister you are taking off just sucks the fumes that build up in your gas tank and stores em untill you start the car and also i think it purges during cruise or something like that... again it is only helping your car.