I tried posting this in the FE Forum, but the page is down. If anyone has a FE Block running in California I need help. I am running a Edelbrock 1406 4-Brl Carb with a fresh 360 V8 and a RV Cam. I have a air/fuel meter gauge on the dash to monitor. With the stock Edelbrock Calibration (#1) for sea level my engine was running 1 hair to rich in idle, cruise, and power modes. I switched to setting #8 and now it runs awful. Now I have Idle 2 hairs too rich, cruise bouncing between rich and lean, and power will surge from way too lean to 3 hairs to rich and my idle is irradic.

I recently moved from Utah (4400 feet in elevation) and I had it set on Calibration #7 and it ran perfectly. I have not been able to get it right since I moved down here.

I need help. What are any of you sea level people ( + or - ) running on your trucks.

I know this thing will not run perfect like fuel injection but I want to get it as close as possible with gas prices being what they are. Any help would be great - thanks!!

 

Are you changing things from inside the vehicle? What is this dial a thing you're talking about? I have 1406s on a boat........no dial a mixture though.....From 4000' to sea level should require a little richening. Either with metering rods/springs, or jets......Other than that you're way ahead of me with this monitoring system.......aMP

 

It's just an Air/Fuel Meter. Auto Meter, Edelbrock sell them in one form or another. In consists of a 2" gauge that has a dial of LED's that display from Lean (Red) to STOICH (Ideal Air/Fuel Ratio) (Orange) then to Rich (Green). It's hooked up to a universal style O2 sensor. It's probably the best $125 dollars I ever spent on this truck.

I am going to play with my timing see if I can get it to work that way. I am running 10 degree's and I am going to back it off to 8 or so and see what that does.

As of right now I am not too terribly concerned about getting the carb adjusted just perfectly. I would rather have it just running! The POS broke down on me on way up to Tahoe to do some camping. I had it towed back home and have not had a chance to look at it yet. I think it is just a fuel pump (Auto Zone lifetime with only 1600 miles on it)!

It was cruising up to Donner's Summit on I-80 just great. I was passing Cummins and Strokers and just feeling great with my old ride when it started to just loose power and before I knew it I had the accelerator burried to keep it going 65mph and it just kept dying, and dying and I got off an exit got to the bottom of the ramp and stopped. Reved the motor.... seemed fine started to get back on the on-ramp and it felt like the automatic transmission was slipping but then it was running liked it was starved for fuel. It got worse and worse as I was trying to finesse it and then it just wouldn't start altogether. I pulled the fuel line and it was drizzling a stream of fuel but nothing I would say is healthy. So I will tear into and see what my "New Problem" is.

I know I am just ticked off at it right now, but I am getting really tired of these old trucks. This is my 6th '67 - '72 F-Series I have had over the years since I was 16 years old. You are always working on them. It seems like when you want to go somewhere and use it on a long trip you have to plan weeks in advance and make sure everything is in good order to go. I know if I just forked out the cash and did a ground up restoration and brought it back to new it would not seem so bad. But being married, having two little boys there is not enough time in a day or cash for that matter to make that restoration happen anytime soon. My old '92 F-250 was great, I did'nt have to do anything to that but change the oil and feed it. If I wanted to go somewhere, I could load up and go.

I will get off my soap box now - thanks!

 

If you went down to sea level and it ran good at #1 going to #8 is only leaner. You might get away with air screw adjustment and or only the needle from the #8 set up. Also maybe a softer spring I don't recall off hand the color but I think it was blue.

 

I'd be using a vac guage to set the mixture screws and timing-idle, then leave the carb spring stuff till that was done. Just got back from a boating adventure at around 3500 and know what your going through. Forgot about that tuning and started it at the dock here to be real shocked at the idle/mix scenario LOL

Maybe check the oil for fuel smell when you tinker with that pump.

 

This may sound simple, but I've experienced the same thing. Runs good, then loses power. It was a clogged fuel filter. The old trucks get some rust in the tank and it clogs the filters. Other than that, I'd look close at the fuel pump, or even a pinched fuel line.

 

also if your pump doesnt have a filter in it, get the one that does, its an option with these trucks. if you get a piece of rust or dirt in the pump then the check valves will not seal and the pump will not pump properly. had this happen to one of my pumps that had no filter element in the pump. yes tune with vacuum gauges, they tell you when your running best after you make a change. the more vacuum the better youre running.
remember, at sea level your getting more atmospheric pressure to push that air in, so its gonna change a lot of things. vacuum changing can change the rate at which your needles move, so you might have to change spring rates. its a headache, hopefully you have had a dirty filter and you can get the mixture straightened out after you fix that problem.
if you really want to save a liitle bit of fuel try driving with a vacuum gauge installed in the cab and try to only give it enough throttle so that vacuum doesnt drop! but then who can do that?

 

sorry to bring up old posts but I think u are using a short band o2 sensor. This does absoutly nothing for you except for at idle. If you want to know your correct a/f mixture u need to invest in a wideband o2 sensor, I Have used the plx m-300. Search that it is pretty nice!

 

It is a narrow band: http://autometer.com/cat_accessoriesdetail.aspx?vid=162

I don't see how it would be of any use if only used at idle - the whole point of this kit is to be able to calibrate a carb for the useful spectrum of RPM.

 

narrowband doesnt show anything except for during idle. Goodluck if u are trying to tune a vehicle with this. It is based on a 0v-1v system so rich is 1 v and lean is 0 v. Think in terms of light switches. On or off. It will show stoich but that is just the gauge determining that the probe is telling it 1v 0v 1v 0v 1v 0v and so on. Ever notice that these gauges bounce around alot. If you dont believe me get a wideband o2 and sensor and hook it up u will be blown away at how off the narrowband is!

 

I only use this kit for the purpose of setting idle and cruise mixture settings - so I can pass emissions. I am well aware that a narrowband does not work on Wide Open Throttle or heavy acceleration. But for setting an idle and cruise setting - narrow band works just fine. When a narrow band gauge is sweeping from side to side (from one extreme to the other) that is telling you the air/fuel is outside it's range of voltage / sensor capacity. Mine will sweep or go out of range when it's cold at idle and under wide open throttle.

For everyone refer to this link - it has some great information: http://autometer.com/tech_faq_answer.aspx?sid=1&qid=48

 

My previous car was a 1995 240sx built to the max, turboed and alot of electronics to monitor and control. In it I had a shortband and a wideband and even at idle they didnt always match. Shortband's really have no use except to say rich or lean!