1978 F150 will not start when cold
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1978 F150 will not start when cold
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I recently bought a 78 F-150 4wh dr and this thing will not start if it's below 45 or 50 degrees. Otherwise it starts good. I believe it is a 400M. Has an edelbrock performer intake, and edelbrock carb with electric choke. Motor uses oil, but have not yet checked compression. Timing is set at 4 btdc.
One a good day, with the key off, I press the gas to release the choke, turn the key, and it fires up. Idles ok for about 20 seconds then starts getting real rich. So I then have to play with the gas a little and it runs good.
On a cold day, I do the same process, it fires up and dies. I turn the key to off and when I turn it back to on, the engine will run backwards any where from a half revolution to maybe two revolutions and burps up through the carb quite a bit. (I blew up one starter already).
So I'm wondering if it could be due to compression, or maybe something electrical. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
I recently bought a 78 F-150 4wh dr and this thing will not start if it's below 45 or 50 degrees. Otherwise it starts good. I believe it is a 400M. Has an edelbrock performer intake, and edelbrock carb with electric choke. Motor uses oil, but have not yet checked compression. Timing is set at 4 btdc.
One a good day, with the key off, I press the gas to release the choke, turn the key, and it fires up. Idles ok for about 20 seconds then starts getting real rich. So I then have to play with the gas a little and it runs good.
On a cold day, I do the same process, it fires up and dies. I turn the key to off and when I turn it back to on, the engine will run backwards any where from a half revolution to maybe two revolutions and burps up through the carb quite a bit. (I blew up one starter already).
So I'm wondering if it could be due to compression, or maybe something electrical. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
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check choke pull off choke has to open 1/8- 1/4 inch after start if not it will flood like the river in north dakota. as for timing i think it is close but 10 degrees seems more like it ?? with all that fuel in there the engine will probably do some strange things good luck
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Thanks for the help. I took farmdudes advise and used a screwdriver to hold the choke open about 1/4 inch. It did not seem to change the symptoms at all. Funny thing, if I can see any humor now, is even after the truck sat about an hour, when I went out and turned the hey to the on position, the motor rotated a few degrees as though it fired some gas in the cylinders without the starter even engaging. One more thing I should add, the previous owner melted the control unit, ( I guess that's what it's called. The square aluminum unit on the fenderwell), because you can see the melted epoxy that had ran down the fenderwell. That bad unit was replaced by him, I have it, but could there be a relationship here? It seems as though it could be electrical. The engine will fire up then stop. When I turn the key to off, and then back to "on", it will usually try to run backwards a turn or two. Thanks again for the help.
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What the.... Maybe the ignition switch is bad? After more frustrating attempts, I found that it appeared to run if I held the key in the start position for a minute. (bad idea I know), and when I switched to run, it quit. BUT when I turned partially back to start, it ran OK without the starter engaged. Could it be that in the cold, something in the switch contracts enough to prevent it from runing? As I said, it always starts right up, but dies immediately after I let the switch go back to run, and when I turn the key off, and back to on, it's like something is energized to allow the engine to try and run backwards. Seems crazy. I'll try my new method in the morning and see what happens. If I can duplicate it again, I guess I'll go buy a switch.
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From: Austin, TX
When you try to start it cold the second time and it spits out the carb, are you sure that's not an intake backire? An intake backfire is very common with an open choke on a cold start. The next time you try to start it cold, press the gas pedal, pull off the air cleaner and make sure the choke has snapped shut.
The most common reason people switch to manual chokes is because they either ignore or are unaware of the proper procedure for adjusting an electric choke. When set properly, an electric choke works just as well and is much more convenient.
The most common reason people switch to manual chokes is because they either ignore or are unaware of the proper procedure for adjusting an electric choke. When set properly, an electric choke works just as well and is much more convenient.
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