Ok I apologize for my chicken little "the sky is falling" drama post earlier; the throttle blade is not off kilter and the screw is not missing, it was just shadows and imagination.


But the primary throttles were staying open a little, one blade was not seating properly. The blades will only go on one way, they are angle cut around the edges I guess. And I could not get both screws to line up perfectly AND have the blade seated properly at the same time. It was a choice of seated properly and one screw in place, the other you can't start, or both screws started but the blade slightly askew. So I took the blade back to my drill press just opened up the holes a tiny bit, just to the next size, and then I was able to get both screws started and snugged down with the blade seated. But I still don't like that the secondaries can flop open 10 degrees. I suppose the vacuum thing is supposed to keep it closed unless forced open by the throttle, or allowed to flop open by lack of vacuum. I have not put it all back together yet though.

 

The throttle being held open from the blades not seating right cannot help with not able to get the idle lower.

That picture of the bottom are there 2 screws missing holding the throttle plate to the carb body?
I see 2 holes in the center between the 4 openings for the throttle blades that look like they should have screws in them.
I dont think there is 1 in the vary center just the 2 to the outside.

Also looking at that picture on the left side between the linkage I see a screw with a spring on it that looks like can only be adjusted from the bottom.
Could that be the choke fast idle speed adjustment as it also looks like the step cam for it right there above it (gold step?)?

On the secondary throttle moving with the carb turned right side up remove the cap on the vacuum.
There should be a spring just under the cap pushing down on the diaphragm IIRC. The springs have different colors and spring rates and how you adjust how fast / slow they open.
Too light a spring and they open too fast and you get a bog. Too heavy a spring and it may not open or open to slowly and not all the way.
I am thinking the spring is not there, to weak to push it back down or it installed under the diaphragm.

Somewhere I should have the carb I took off the Javelin that ran too lean and it may of also had a high idle, cant remember now after over 10 years.
If I remember it is a double pumper as the car is a manual transmission, autos should use vacuum secondary carbs.
If I can find it, did not see it when looking the other day but was not looking for it but a big bin, maybe if what you just did dose not work we can bolt it on and see what that dose.
Dave ----

 

Some one in the 300 motor area posted this https://www.thecarbcheater.com/ and with out reading the 300 motor area post look the site over and tell me what is your thoughts are?
Then read the 300 motor area post and your thoughts again.
Thunder head 289 I have seen some of his videos and they are ok but nothing I would wright home about and say got to see this!
Dave ----

 

Well I would say it's interesting, just from glancing over it. But I'm not 100% clear on it, I can see it's a data logger etc.

There were no screws in those 2 holes initially and the screws that hold the base to the body won't fit in there. I don't think it has anything in there. I googled for Holley 1850-5 and started going through pics and looks like they are all left open.

Did not do anything with the truck yesterday the carb is still sitting on the tailgate. I told Bailey I would come help him today with brakes on his new Corvette. It's a 1981 and his old Corvette is a 1979. He bought caliper rebuild kits to redo the original calipers, and he did 3 of them but one was frozen up and too bad a shape to mess with so he bought one from Autozone. When we did the reverse pressure bleeding (not sure what it's called, but it pushes fluid from the bleeder valve on the caliper up to the master cylinder) all of the calipers held fluid except one; the new one from the parts store! He said no way Autozone will have one in stock as they had to order it for him and wait a few days, but since he rebuilt 3 of them this week he knew his way around it pretty good so he quickly took it apart. The new seals looked good no obvious failing there but when I ran my finger over the sealing surface I could feel a dip. So I got a file and started going across, yep definitely a low spot right where it was supposed to seat against the seal. So I kept filing across it until it was flat and shiny, took at least 5 minutes. Put it back together, no more leaks.

Have Bailey pump the brakes slowly several times until I saw no more bubbles coming up, at that point figure all the caliper and all the brake lines should have fluid in them. So then we go to traditional bleeding, get a little bit of air here and there but not more than 1 or 2 pumps before we are seeing good clear brake fluid with no air. Go for a test drive, no brakes - feet going straight to the floor! Come back in the garage start going around wheel to wheel, find one of the back wheels completely wet with brake fluid. So getting in there with a light while Bailey pumped, I could see it leaking at his brake line fitting.

He says "oh man I can't believe THAT is leaking, I paid extra for the upgrade stainless steel line" I said aha!! I think we got a clue. Stainless is a lot harder and take a lot to get it to seal right. So I did the "loosen it up, retighten it" thing over and over, each time you do it seats a little further than it did before. Then retest, no more brake fluid seeping around the line connection. Checked the other side as it's a new stainless line also, same thing just not as bad. The connection was wet although I didn't see bubbling out, but still after loosing/tighting 3 times it stayed dry.

But dangit still the brake pedal goes to the floor and barely even slows you from a 5 mph creeping idle. So I called it a day by that point I had been there 4 hours, and his wife was just coming home from work, so I said we can try again another day but thats a lot of time to be out in the heat. On the way home it gave me time to think - I retightened one end of two stainless lines, but never gave any thought to the other end! So at least that is something to check, it's gotta be a leak somewhere causing this.

 

That device is just a controlled vacuum leak based on a O2 reading that the computer gets to open / close a valve.
The guy in the motor area swears by it to get him 25 MPG with his 4.9 / M5OD 5sp and 3.55 gear pickup.

After back & forth with the guy you need to dial the carb in close to 14.7 so the unit can make adjustments to keep it at 14.7.
My thing is if the carb is still putting in say XXX amount of fuel and say running 12.5 AFR how can adding a vacuum leak to get the AFR to 14.7 with the same amount of XXX fuel going in get better MPG?
The video from Thunder head 289 has the idle RPM up at like 850 RPM when the unit is working and that is almost if not using the main jets?
He also said the 850 RPM is to show it is working as he has his lower and only changes 25 RPM between off & on.

I dont know about spending $400 on a vacuum leak, you still need to "dial in" the carb to make it work and have a display on your phone or like me $250 for a AFR gauge below the dash and you still need to "dial in" the carb. I have a tach and to see the vacuum on the manifold I could get a gauge and run it into the cab if I wanted to. BTW my Javelin has a vacuum gauge and tach from the factory.
Thing is mine is easy to read, and I can move it to other cars / trucks without undoing a lot of wires and vacuum hoses.

With the heat and finding that new caliper bad I would have shot the car full of holes and called it a day LOL. To pull a new (rebuilt) caliber apart to fix it is BS.
Then again before my truck was on the road I had a new wheel cylinder leak just sitting in the garage, dont think I even bled the brakes yet
I did have the rebuilt master that came with the rebuilt booster go bad in about a year. I went with new on the master and been fine since.
That is why I hate SS brake lines, they just dont seal. I see too many posts on the AMC forum of that and why I would not use them.
I hope you are right about the other end of the lines maybe leaking. Is the master new / rebuilt or old?

Because it is so hot I have not gone out to cut the grass and it needs it again as it grows fast with this heat and rain.
I also have not pulled the front grille and head lights on the tractor so I can start fitting the new head lights.
Son put power to one inside the house on high and it was bright, low was not bad either but think going to wire them on high
With new head lights I could then cut the grass at night when cooler.
Dave ----

 

So you are supposed to get your carb dialed in and running right, and then this system introduces vacuum leak to make you go lean whenever possible, for fuel mileage? I thought maybe it was just snake oil

Bailey still has leaks, despite me going back over yesterday. One caliper was dripping, he went to parts store and got a new one (which I think means reman) and then installed it, I had to leave already by that time, but he texted me later and said the new one is still leaking.

To answer your other question, the brake booster and master cylinder are new. Replaced by previous owner. New as in most likely meaning reman.

On my carburetor, does it matter if I use the square opening type as the base, or do I need to use the 4 round hole style? The one with round holes got torn but I have 3 of the square hole style in my parts box.

 

On that vacuum leak: you get the carb close to the 14.7 but still a little on the rich side and the unit then adds air to the intake to lean it out to 14.7.
Now if it is lean say 16.5, it cannot make it rich only leaner. I also cant see how it can help with MPG as the same amount of rich fuel is still entering the motor and air leaning it out not less fuel.
The person that posted about it has not tried MPG with out it so he is going to give 2 tank full without it to see what he gets.
The only thing he did say is because it is running at the 14.7 the oil will / should stay cleaner between changes and I can see that but for $400 that is a lot of oil changes!

If I was Bailey and had that first store bought rebuilt that leaked I would have gone for the more money one of new.
Why were the ones on the car rebuilt were they leaking? Brakes are not something I go cheap on and if you own a car like that you know it takes money to replace any parts on it.
I would do 4 NEW calipers, replace ALL rubber hoses and hope the PO did replace the master. Again just not worth going cheap on brakes in my book.

No, the gasket should not make a difference but the only thing to check is that the gasket covers the full base of the carb.
Flip the carb bottom up and place the gasket on it to make sure it coves the full base.
Then do the same on the intake manifold. A Holley has a square bolt pattern as dose the intake so should not have any problems with that.
Where I have seen problems is when using an adapter between intake and carb. Sometimes the adapter bolt holes are not covered / sealed by the gasket.
My sons Jeep had that problem as he is running a Holley 2300 v2 carb and needed adapter from the Jeep v2 intake manifold.

But a gasket leak like above would show up when you cover the carb like I did as the RPM would come down. Yours did not it was more like the choke was on with no fast idle as it started to run ruff / rich.
When I go through cutting the grass today, a 4 hour tractor ride in the heat when I closed up the garage it was 96* in there and the doors were open.
I will get out there when I get home from the gym at 6am and try to find the carb I pulled from the Javelin.
I would also like to look at the one you have in person maybe I will see something?
Dave ----

 

Well Bailey knew the car had no brakes when he bought it, although the previous owner said new booster and master cylinder. He found the lines to the master cylinder were loose, like they put the new master on but didn't bother to snug the lines down. He initially planned to replace all 4 calipers and just start with new, that was what he did with the 79, but that was a few months ago and he had stumbled into a close-out sale for $40 each. No more sale, now they're $100 each, so he opted to just rebuild them and save the money. His plan was ok on 3 of them but the 4th one was frozen up, so he replaced it. When the new one was leaking he thought about taking it back, but figured they would not have one in stock and wanted to just quickly see if it was a bad seal, as he still had the unused rebuild kit for the 4th caliper that he bought before knowing it was froze up. But when he took it off the seal was new and looked good, but running my finger over the surface I could feel a dip. So I filed it flat and smooth. He asked me if that was something he should have done on the ones he rebuilt, I said yes always, you don't have to take meat off it just run the file across the surface and look for the shiny spots to be even all the way across. So he did not do that on the 3 he took apart and replaced the seals in. I don't know if you can get brand new ones at the auto parts store anymore, I would guess they might all be reman units now. Being that it's a Corvette though the aftermarket has a wide selection of new calipers that are better than what it came with but of course they think Corvette owners are rich so that stuff is pricey. Over 600 for front and same again for rear.

4 hours on a mower in this heat is more than anybody should have to take! It was brutal outside today. I didn't do much, I ran errands, but just carrying groceries across the Walmart parking lot was like walking through a sauna.

I still have the carb on the tailgate of the truck, I didn't get around to reinstalling it yet. I think correcting the butterflies so that they seal properly is going to solve the high idle issue.

 

It is nice to say "I own XXX" but you have to have the bank roll for some of them and vets are 1 of them and he has 2
I hate to say this but it sounds like he dose not know just what he is doing with the brake rebuild.
Did he run a hone in the calipers where the piston / seal ride to have a good smooth surface for the seal to ride? If there were any pits it would need to be sleaved or replaced.
Think you need a little brake fluid as lube when going back together like oil on the oil filter seal.
After he gets the brakes working what else needs to be done to the car to get it on the road?

Dave ----

 

Not up to speed on the brake drama yet. But it sounds like if the calipers aren't leaking and just the lines are, he needs new crush washers. They are a one a done. If you have to take off and put on several times they won't hold up to that.

Could be at the banjo fittings as well. Any photos of the leaks?

Reverse bleeding is a good way to pump all the air out initially. But a proper furthest to closest pump bleed after is still a good way to get the pressure build up and all the lines full.

If the booster, and master are dry and the calipers are dry, it's got to be a fitting or washer. And starting from scratch it may need several rounds of bleeding.

Good luck.

 

The Corvette calipers are 2 piece unit that bolts together, with 4 pistons - 2 per side. The rears have a hard line that is about 8 inches long with a flare fitting at both end; one end to the caliper and the other end to a rubber line that goes from the control arm to the hardline by the frame. He has new rubber lines on all 4 corners, and the little hard lines are both new stainless lines. Now I detected leakage / seepage on the stainless lines, I had to loosen and retighten them to get them to stop seeping. Something with stainless lines being harder than steel, you have to work at them to get them to seal. Every time I loosen it and retighten it, the wrench goes further than it was before. But all of those fittings / connections are staying dry now. The fluid is leaking down from the caliper and you can't really see where because it's hidden by the rotor. Is it one of the 4 piston seals leaking? Or is it one of the O-rings that seals one half of the caliper from the other? You can't tell once it's all assembled all you can see is that fluid is dripping down. It's a frustrating setup!

No I do not think he honed out the sealing area for the pistons, he disassembled them, replaced the seals, and reassembled it. But the one that is leaking noticably now is the reman unit from Autozone. I agree he probably did not know what he was doing, he's young and this is his first rebuild and like most young people, he just youtube'd it to get the general idea. Yet I have to admit that 2 of the 3 that he redid are bone dry and both of the Autozone reman units have had problems.

Aside from the brakes this car doesn't need much to be roadworthy. The suspension is in decent shape (the other Corvette, the 79, is so terrible that if you hit a bump it wallows all over the road, all the ball joints are shot) and the engine runs good and does not overheat (his 79 on the other hand runs hot and probably needs a new radiator and / or water pump).

 

Ah. So it's not the lines its the calipers. I just looked it up and seems to be a very common issue with the reman calipers.

Maybe you will find something useful in this thread: Leaking Caliper

Seems like a piston/o-ring rebuild is in order. Or what you have already done, hone the surface flat so it does not tear the o-rings.

 

I dont remember where the Javelin dual piston calipers were leaking from when I got the car and at the time NO ONE had rebuilt or kits so I could or anyone that would rebuild them.
They were a 3 year only, 68 - 70, disc brake setup and different than GM / Ford / Chry.
If you could get them that did not leak you could not get pads or rotors that are non-vented from the factory.
I will not get into what needs to be done when you put it all together to center the caliper with shims to the rotor, its a ****ty set up.

71 AMC went to vented rotors and depending on the size of the car used a GM setup that moved on 1 screw in pins, or the Ford with a wedge / spring and locking bolt to hold the wedge / spring in place.
What is nice is the spindles bolt on I think like the Stude so you can swap the spindle on out for a better setup.
The drag car had 76 Gremlin setup (Ford) with non-power master & pedals were the street Javelin has Concord (GM) setup.

Now what gets hard to get is rotors for either system. When they first came out it was bearing hub and rotor disc as 1.
Last I heard you can only get the rotor disc and you have to knock the lug bolts out, so you need to get new ones, and move the bearing hub over to the new rotor and press in new lug bolts.

Oh Wilwood says it has disc kits but that is a **** show too because of the 3 different spindles AMC used and IIRC Wilwood only made the kit to fit 1 spindle and I dont remember what one that is now as I was part of the measuring group as I had the odd ball AMC spindle and why 1 of my wheel assy. is a part in boxes.
There was 1 other company https://www.scarebird.com/ that used different manf. parts and made the caliper brackets. It was something like use a Ford mini truck rotor and a small car GM caliper and houses from something else.
It was better than nothing as AMC spindles / brackets are getting hard to come by.
I know a lot more than you really needed to know
Dave ----

 

Thanks for that link James, good reading. I forwarded that to Bailey. I don't know what his financial situation is but if it was my car I'd spend the $ for aftermarket performance parts, since they are 1 piece then you have fewer chances for a leak.

Dave I am familiar with scarebird I have visited that site many times. He has a kit for a Mustang like mine for less than $300, uses Toyota rotors and GM Calipers. I guess with an AMC it is a real chore to find the right things to make it work.

There is a disc brake kit for the Studebaker available through the Stude catalogs, it involves Ford Gran Torino rotors, the stock spindles with a sleeve, and I think GM calipers there as well. I emailed scarebird and asked if he a kit for Studebaker and he said no, but if he had a car to use as a template he could work it out. I guess if you have a CAD and a water jet to cut 1/4 plate and a wild imagination you can make a disc brake kit for anything

 

AMC had 3 different spindles, drum, 68-70 disc and 71> disc.
Bird only list a kit for AMC drum spindles, I am pretty sure I still have the ones from the drag car when I swapped the Gremlin disc on.
The kit also uses Toyota rotors and GM calipers. You have to remove the hub from the drum and may need to machine the hub to fit inside the rotor.
I did see they have a custom made "monster" GM caliper that the piston is 20% larger that fits their brackets I guess you could use on larger cars, that is cool.

I was looking over the site to see if they listed a kit for the Stude and did not see one but wondered if Hudson might work?
The other thing I seen was they were bought out in 2023 and the new people have and want to make a lot more kits for different cars & trucks.
Dave ----