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Yes and all it really does is take, some, of the emmisions and turn it into water. Whats your point? They had these as early as the early 70's when they got rid of leaded gasoline but the cars were still carburated. Whats your point?
Carbon dioxide is not considered emmisions by any auto law/auto regulation I am aware of. Emmissions are carbon monoxide, unburned (or partially burned) fuel, and for diesel engines the quantity of visible smoke in exhaust is quantified.
So, the catalytic converters help burning the unburned fuel that goes out of the engine, and if I remember correctly helps burning the CO transforming it in CO2.
The carburettor don't supply such a low and uniform spreading of fuel droplets than a injection pump would, so the carburettor engines will generate usually more unburnt fuel than fuel injected ones. Carburettors optimised for high airflow (high performance at high rpm) would generate bigger droplets at idle, so it will burn more fuel
So, the catalytic converters help burning the unburned fuel that goes out of the engine, and if I remember correctly helps burning the CO transforming it in CO2.
The carburettor don't supply such a low and uniform spreading of fuel droplets than a injection pump would, so the carburettor engines will generate usually more unburnt fuel than fuel injected ones. Carburettors optimised for high airflow (high performance at high rpm) would generate bigger droplets at idle, so it will burn more fuel
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But carbs have High and low speed settings. So your thoguht of bigger drops is wrong with the use of the low speed idle settings on a carb.
Originally posted by: funboy42
But people especially the younger crowd have been brain washed into thinking that a computer controled car with all its gadgets is sooo much better. I can bet anything that with the technology we have today we can do away with all the un-needed crap and build a carb that can stand up to anything we use today (the chinese are doing it). But alot of people have been brain washed and the auto makers did it and love it because it is all about the bottom end and how they can squeese every dime out of our pockets and make it look as though we needed it.
The government does it to us everyday and we take it or alot of people dont see it and so do the car makers. If EFI was soooo good and sooooo perfect whay dont they use it on stock cars and dragsters?
Sure the new cars you dont have to tune as often but look at the cost to tune it when it does.
Platinum plugs at atlest $10 each vs 99 cents.
Points $5 vs individual coil packs at $50+ each
If you dont mess with a carbs setting it generraly will not go out.
Well thats is for a car from the 1960's so lets look at more for the car of today
Injectors
O2 sensors
MAF sensors
MAP sensors
Computers
Throttle bodies
Knock Sensors
Sensors to look at sensors and over compensate when a sensor goes out.
Lets talk repairs
1960s if a part goes bad you know and hear it and its mechanical only. To repair almost any jo blow could do it.
Todays car part goes bad pay up the butt for another computer to talk to your computer to find what sensor(s) go bad and still have to pay for a broken mechanical part so you get it twice up your rump. Computer crap and mechanical and the auto makers laugh all the way to the bank. To repair you can forget it there is no room to get in there. Most work requires a lift, in some cases you need to take the engine cage out of the car (ford winstars and Chevy cameros just to name a few). Need special tools, computers, training to work on it if you have the money which most do not so they have to pay someone $50+ an hour just to work on it and then they mark up the price of the parts 35% or more. Then you have hazardous waste charges, shop supply charges, charges for more charges
I can keep going on how were brain washed into thinking how much better computer cars are so much better but there you have it in a nut shell that its all done as a bunch of bs making you think its all needed but really its all about money and nothing more.
replacing sensors and electronic items is cake compared to doing something more major. diagnosing these problems can be hard (unless you own a diagnostic tool - which i do). with the internet i've been able to diagnose any problem i've had with my car and take care of it myself.
Ever heard of a catalytic convertor?[/quote]
Yes, since I've been in the automobile repair business for my whole life, I certainly have.
And I repeat: If your car is burning cleaner, but gets 1/2 the mileage of a car that burns a little less clean, then you will ultimately put out more emissions.
Catalytic converter has absolutely nothing to do with this undisputable fact.
my first car was 1970 ford maverick, the car that replaced the falcon, it was easy on gas, but not 30 mpg, but I had 200 6cyl and auto tranny. it was a very good car , paid 115 dollars for it, drove it very hard for 3 years
- Oct 10, 1999
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There was a competition back in the late 50's and early 60's for best fuel economy, but I can't remember what it was called.Originally posted by: funboy42
up to 30 mile per gallon and is heavy as all hell, carb'd, and not one computer anything on it. And yet we went to computer controlled cars because they are supposed to get us better fuel economy and other bull crap I dont belive except to raise the price of the car and to have it serviced.
But video is still cool and somewhat funny to watch
EDIT May have to click link a few times for it to play video for some reason
Numerous compacts would enter and get pretty darn good mileage, even by today's standards.
Cars like: Buick Skylark (215 aluminum V8), Valiant (198 slant 6), Falcon (200 inline 6?), etc...
Shell used to have a fuel mileage competition for automakers.
But, all this talk of carb'd cars brings back memories.............
Memories of "automatic" chokes that became anything but automatic....
Flooding of carbs.......vapor locking........accelerator pumps not pumping......fuel bowl floats not floating........and on and on. This doesn't touch the fun one had synchronizing two or three carbs...........
Of course, one does miss the sound of a large-bore Holley or the rear barrels of a Quadra-Junk, errr.....QuadraJet, carb opening up at WOT.
But, why try to compare old tech to the new stuff? The newer stuff works better with less overall work.
I just wonder how many on this board ever had the fun of trying to dry out the brakes on their full-drum braked car after going through a deep puddle and having a quick stop ahead? Now THAT was fun!!! Or the nice full-metal dashboards WITHOUT padding anywhere?
But, all this talk of carb'd cars brings back memories.............
Memories of "automatic" chokes that became anything but automatic....
Flooding of carbs.......vapor locking........accelerator pumps not pumping......fuel bowl floats not floating........and on and on. This doesn't touch the fun one had synchronizing two or three carbs...........
Of course, one does miss the sound of a large-bore Holley or the rear barrels of a Quadra-Junk, errr.....QuadraJet, carb opening up at WOT.
But, why try to compare old tech to the new stuff? The newer stuff works better with less overall work.
I just wonder how many on this board ever had the fun of trying to dry out the brakes on their full-drum braked car after going through a deep puddle and having a quick stop ahead? Now THAT was fun!!! Or the nice full-metal dashboards WITHOUT padding anywhere?
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Everything has its drawbacks.
Bonus for carbs: a failed sensor or chip doesn't render my car non-driveable.
Negative for carbs: they get dirty and need to be rebuilt. A messy, time consuming job.
I happen to like carbs and EFI.
Nothing gives you more satisfaction than fixing/tuning/rebuilding a carb and seeing an improvement in both driveability and power. You just don't get that same feeling by reprogramming your fuel-curve.
There are still those of us that like getting our hands dirty with "old tech".
Squisher
Lifer
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Ahh the qurada-junk. I went to a place in the ghetto right next to the rouge plant, Acme carburetor (no kidding). Someone had been dumping a bunch of experimental quadrajets in their scavenging bin. I took the parts off of 4 of them to make one good one and they sold it to me for $10. I put that thing on my 400ci Pontiac Catalina. BaaaaWaaaaaa.
Nothing like the dash from a '67 Bonneville.
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Im just a old man at heart I guess. I would so much rather have a older car with no electronics and be able to weork on it myself then to have some computer thingy controll my ride. For me there really isnt anything like fliping the air cleaner upside down so you can hear the secondaries open up on a good old chevy quadrajunk carb. I miss the sound of the sucking coming out from under the hood. Now a days cars sound like lawnmowers with hardly no suck sounds at all from under the hood
One thing to keep in mind is that they didn't have strict ratings standards back then. The claimed HP rating for those cars was often far from the actual HP output. They also measured the HP by gross output (no accessories attached) as compared to net ratings today. I wouldn't be surprised if the Falcon didn't get close to 30 mpg.
Also, if you look at the HP and weight of the 1960 Ford Falcon, you'll see that cars with similar weight and HP today get better gas mileage. The Falcon weighed about what a Honda Civic HX weighs, and has less horsepower. And yet the Civic HX gets 44 mpg compared to an optimistic 30.
This is completely false.
A carbureted engine is completely open loop. There is no feedback so the engine has no idea how much fuel it really needs. When you floor it, it just dumps the amount of gas you have it adjusted to use.
A computerized fuel injected car is closed loop. From the data the sensors provide, the computer knows exactly how much air is entering the engine, it knows exactly how much fuel to provide by looking at the fuel maps, it's able to control the exact amount of fuel by using fuel injectors, and it can measure the oxygen content in the exhaust in order to fine-tune the mixture it gives. Not only does it produce cleaner emissions, but it also produces less emissions since it's getting better fuel economy.
A carbureted car cannot do this. You can only set an "average" tune for a carburetor and that's it. The mixture it gives the engine will deviate with changes in air temperature and air pressure. It can't compensate for this.
There are a lot of myths started by people who don't understand the way computer controlled engines work. There are old-timers who believe that carburetors will make more power than fuel injectors and crap like that. But if you look at the science behind it, you'll realize that all the carb does is provide a fuel/air mixture. Whatever mixture a carb can provide, a fuel injector can provide also. And the fuel injector can be adusted on the fly, in mid-operation, to quickly adapt to changing conditions, a carburetor cannot. In short, fuel injection allows you to stay in the sweet spot all the time, instead of setting one when you tune the carb. A good carb tuner can get close, but it's never exact. Take a look at a dyno sometime and look at the fuel/air ratio of a carbed car. And then look at the f/a ratio of a fuel injected car. The fuel injected car will be able to achieve a near perfect burn all throughout the RPM range since the computer adjusts the fuel/air mixture on the fly.
There's also no conspiracy by the automakers to use computer controlled engines to make more money. For one, they don't make more money by putting expensive stuff in the car. These emissions controls are mandated by the federal government, the automakers do not have a choice. If they could help their bottom line by selling the car for the same price but with a cheaper, simpler engine, they would.
Sure, a car with a carb can get good fuel economy. Just set it to run real lean. A car with a carb can also do good on the dragstrip. Just set it to run well at wide-open throttle and have it run a bit rich.
But I'd like to see you run the car that's set to run lean on the dragstrip. Watch it detonate. And I'd like to see what kind of fuel economy the car setup for drag gets.
That's the problem with carbs- they can do one or the other, but not both.
However, a fuel injected car can do both. It can run lean when the throttle settings are light. And it will richen up a bit at WOT. It can adjust while you are driving it, to deliver optimal settings in all driving conditions.
Also, look at your ignition timing. You can have it run advanced or retarded depending on where in the powerband you want the car to run best. I remember playing with the ignition timing on my old carbed/distributed Toyota- I advanced the ignition timing and my low end torque was amazing for that little engine. I never felt that thing break traction from a stop before. It sucked at high RPM though. Then I retarded the timing. It turned into a slug from a stop but at high RPM that thing ran great. Eventually I had to settle for a realistic setting in the middle.
But newer cars have distributorless ignition systems. The computer can advance the ignition timing at low rpm and then retard it at higher rpm's, getting the best of both worlds.
yeah the Falcon was ok,but it would not go very fast.
The Valiant was better.
I own a 1964 Plymouth Valiant,with the optional 273 V8,I rebuilt the engine
last fall added a bigger cam,a 4 bbl carb,and dual exhaust.
I just took it on a road trip and got from 16-21 mpg,at Not slow speeds.LOL.
I took it a few weeks ago on a trip and got 23 mpg,I never went over 75 on That trip.
The Valiant was better.
I own a 1964 Plymouth Valiant,with the optional 273 V8,I rebuilt the engine
last fall added a bigger cam,a 4 bbl carb,and dual exhaust.
I just took it on a road trip and got from 16-21 mpg,at Not slow speeds.LOL.
I took it a few weeks ago on a trip and got 23 mpg,I never went over 75 on That trip.
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I wasn't sure how I was going to respond to both posts, but here goes:
1. you tune a carb for the specific application: fuel economy, racing or what have you. Just set it to run lean, that's how carbs get good fuel economy. Yeah, right. Again the whole package must be designed for the application.
2. there is nothing wrong with distributors.
3. I will not get into the EFI vs carb which makes more power arguement. It has been proven that carbs make more peak power than the EFI version does. EFI tends to make a flatter torque curve. Both Hot Rod and Car Craft have debated this issue adnausuem. Drop it already.
4. if you don't know jack about carbs or distributor ignitions then don't comment on it. Ooh, I advanced my dist. and my bottom end felt better but my top end sucked. I bet you don't even know why, do you? If you did you wouldn't have implied that a dist. ingition sucks. Is it perfect? Nope. It has drawbacks just like crank trigger ignitions do.
5. sweet spot, eh? All passenger car EFI systems have to follow specific tables for proper running. Unless you alter it, there is actually very little adjustment going on. As for injector bandwidth, no one argues that EFI isn't superior to carbs. However, not all EFI setups are effecient. Mine is not. I have batch fire FI, like a lot of other cars have. Is the fuel atomized better than a carb? Yes. Does it get better fuel economy than a carb? Nope. Is it cleaner in the emmisions? Yes, but not by that much.
6. again, you know little about carbs. Did you know that a carb is tuned to work in the whole powerband that it is designed for? That's right, the metering is different depending on the engine load. Whether idling or cruising at highway speeds or WOT, that carb is constantly adjusting the fuel metering. OMG, how can this be true? Only EFI can do that. Silly rabbit, do some reading. It does this mechanically, not by software.
Carbs are more complicated than you think. They do a great job considering their limitations.
With fuel injection, you can program it to excel in all applications, not just a specific application. Since it's closed loop and you're able to monitor the exhaust, the computer can allow it to run lean while cruising at light loads and make good power at WOT.
Every car manufacturer has abandoned distributors in favor of distributorless ignition systsms. They are superior since you can adjust the spark on the fly.
This is a myth, perpetuated by old-timers who don't understand fuel injection and are afraid of it. Once again, every car manufacturer in the US has abandoned carburetors for fuel injection. As with EFI, it is superior due to its flexibility. It can receive realtime feedback the the fuel/air ratio optimized on the fly. The only reason that EFI has a flatter torque curve is because carbs cannot run optimally throughout the entire RPM range the way EFI can.
I know about carbs and distributors. I had to fix those pieces of crap on my old cars. You're just making ignorant statements. You still have the "old school" attitude about cars- you're probably not afraid to get your hands dirty, but you don't understand the new technology and therefore don't like it.
I fully understand how and why advancing/retarding the ignition works. Since you (hopefully) know that it works, how is a distributorless ignition system inferior in any way? After all, you can control it on the fly and have it work at the optimal setting all the time. It's all done by computer with incredible precision. Picture it this way- let's say you tested numerous different spark advances at a certain rpm to see which delivers the best power. After you find it, you can put it in your ignition timing map. This way, through the entire Rpm range your spark can have the optimal amount of advance, instead of a mechanical advance like distributors have.
WRONG. This is false. They do not blindly follow tables. That is called "open loop" when the computer just tells the engine what to do with no feedback. A modern car does NOT run in open loop all the time. Take my car, for instance- there are only 2 times when it runs in open loop mode- before it has reached operating temperature and during WOT. All other times it receives some feedback. The car relearn its maps. That's why if you unhook the battery of a new car, it won't run at 100% for a few drives- it needs to relearn the optimal settings.
That sure seems like what you and Funboy have been arguing.
I'm talking about real fuel injection systems, not crappy batch fire or throttle body fuel injection.
This is very basic stuff you're talking about here. I already know how carburetors work, my other cars had them, my jet ski has one, and my RC helicopter has a simple one.
Carbs are too complicated for their own good. Back before computer control, a carb was the only way to get the proper a/f mixture and they have to work on mechanical principles alone. They were pretty ingenious But now that we have fuel injection, carbs are obsolete, since FI systems are so much simpler.
Same goes for distributors. Very ingenious devices. They delivered the desired result by the only way possible. The systems of vacuum and mechanical advance were pretty nifty, but they were complicated and prone to failure. With distributorless ignition, none of that mechanical stuff is needed. You just need a crank angle sensor to give you the crank location and the computer does all the calculating. The rest of the system is just coils and transistors.
I'm going to put up some random thoughts, based on things I've read in the last few posts here that I know aren't right:
1. Quadrajunk. Best factory carburetor, EVER. You can tune one to run as fast as you want to. Awesome driveability. It's called "Quadrajunk" by people who don't know what the hell they are doing with it.
2. EFI vs. Carb: It has NEVER, I repeat, NEVER been proven that the carb will make more peak HP. Never. EFI is better in all aspects.
I like carbs, and for hotrods, I prefer them. But EFI is better, and this isn't even a debatable point.
3. Distributors. IW said there's nothing wrong with them. He's right. They work fine. That's not to say that Distributorless systems aren't better, because they are. But Distributors work fine.
4. No old 60's car got 30mpg. Any claim that one did is complete B.S. And the Bronco with a 302 mentioned above didn't, either.
Argue that is did if you want, but there is no way it did, unless it was idling down a big mountain.
5. That's about it. Some good points have been made in here, too.
1. Quadrajunk. Best factory carburetor, EVER. You can tune one to run as fast as you want to. Awesome driveability. It's called "Quadrajunk" by people who don't know what the hell they are doing with it.
2. EFI vs. Carb: It has NEVER, I repeat, NEVER been proven that the carb will make more peak HP. Never. EFI is better in all aspects.
I like carbs, and for hotrods, I prefer them. But EFI is better, and this isn't even a debatable point.
3. Distributors. IW said there's nothing wrong with them. He's right. They work fine. That's not to say that Distributorless systems aren't better, because they are. But Distributors work fine.
4. No old 60's car got 30mpg. Any claim that one did is complete B.S. And the Bronco with a 302 mentioned above didn't, either.
Argue that is did if you want, but there is no way it did, unless it was idling down a big mountain.
5. That's about it. Some good points have been made in here, too.
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