Peeking around the secondary metering rods is pretty difficult to gauge accurately. The appropriate way to measure the fuel level is with a float level gauge through the vent tube.

 

That looks like a long lost tool. I guess I could make something out of a zip tie or something. Don't suppose you could give me a dimension from to bottom to where the measurements start?

 

There was more availability of this tool but appears availability has lessened. Can't guarantee anything will ship as per stated shipping date, supposedly Summit can special order if you're willing to wait a couple weeks.

Standard Motor Products Carburetor Float Level Gauges CT10

 

I am in Canada, which may as well be the GD moon as far as shipping things from the USA

 

Ah...good point.

 

Well, I think I'm making some headway with this.

When the carb arrived from the rebuilders, it came here to Canada from the USA. I guess Customs wanted to make sure there was nothing nefarious in the box so they poked a big ol' hole in it. Like say, with a screw driver or something of that size. Anyway, when I had opened up the box I noticed that the hole was punched straight through to the top of the carb and the vent hole was plugged solid with cardboard. A hole in one right? A perfect straight shot right to the vent hole.

I was pretty pissed at this and I actually popped the top off the carb to blow out the cardboard. I didn't go any further than this.....I saw all the dry cardboard sitting on top of the gasket so I used some compressed air to get rid of what I saw and put it all back together. When I installed the carb, it ran great so I figured I got it all. I guess not.

Look at all the boogers of cardboard I found in the float bowl. There's bits of it everywhere too that don't show up well on the camera, all over the top of the float and stuff. This is a real downer, but par for the course for me and my luck these days. Pretty sure this is causing my problems?

 

Yes, this trash needs to be removed from the carb, as it certainly could cause intermittent "behavior". But I would do a full disassembly and clean because you can't see where it all found its way into. Use a rebuild kit w/ new gaskets for good measure.

This reminds me of a problem I had w/ an old Mercury outboard (3 cyls, dual carbs), it was running bad, and w/ the cover removed I could see that one carb was providing a nice spray pattern while the other was spitting and sputtering fuel into the engine. When I rebuilt it I found some green trash in the jet, looked like it came from a gasket or something. It ran like new once I fixed that.

 

Disassembled the carb today and cleaned it out. Blew out all the passages and ran thin wire through everything.

Runs like a champ again! Just so crazy that this happened. Oh well, at least I learned a few things. My first basic carb clean and rebuild in the books.

 

Glad you found the root cause and were able to correct it.

 

Amazing

 

Any way you can make a claim for damage against Customs? That's kind of inexcusable.

I bought an NOS dry Delco 60K battery some years ago. When it arrived a chunk was broken out of a corner of the box.

When I opened it, the whole top corner of the battery was broken and the guts were exposed. 50 some years in perfect condition and one five day trip with UPS rendered it useless. Went around and around with UPS before I got my money back. But once they figured out I wasn't going away quietly, they paid up.

I wasn't as lucky with a 1970 Toronado carb. I had rebuilt it and on-car tested it and it was working properly. Sold it to a fellow and when he installed it, it kept flooding. Gave him his money back and he shipped it back. Opened it up and somehow the float clip and needle had gotten knocked loose during shipping. Some gorilla had obviously tossed it around and hit something with it.

For that reason I will no longer ship a carburetor.

 

Everything about this issue was crazy, honestly. The fact that it acted up immediately after me messing with the vacuum actuators for the headlights threw me right off the correct path. To my rookie ears, it didn't sound like a carb problem, I was thinking vacuum leak or ignition issue.

Anyway, makes for a good story. I won't be able to do anything about it as I threw out the box and all proof that someone had messed with it as I thought I had fixed it all up myself earlier. The box was packed really well too and the carb inside was fully wrapped in that soft wrappy foam taped all around the body of the carb but it didn't matter. There was a heat seeking missile with the target set straight on that bowl vent........went straight through everything. I paid 120 bucks through UPS for that shipping too. Harsh.

I'll just chock this one up to some bad luck and a learning experience. At least the carb isn't damaged.

 

All gearheads pop that cherry eventually.