Good morning -

I have a 1965 Cutlass with a warmed over 350 installed. I changed the oil yesterday and was met with rather thin oil that wreaked like gas. From my understanding, this could be a couple faults with the carb or a bad fuel pump. Some more background info:

1. Car is hard to start after sitting for 1 week or more. Feels like the bowl is dry.
2. It does run rich but I can't imagine it's THAT rich to thin out the gas like that
3. Fuel pump is probably 20 years old
4. Car doesn't get driven much. I'd estimate 300 miles during nice weather each year. It's more of a "nice morning coffee run" kind of car.

I have much more experience with modern cars, the older carb technology is foreign to me. I'd much rather hookup a laptop and adjust fuel trims.

Any help on how to approach this would be helpful. I'm trying to resist the urge to just get a Sniper and be done with it.

-S

 

Replace the fuel pump, first, then change the oil.


Good luck with that Sniper BS. I tried it once; didn't like it.

 

Once you get the carb sorted, make sure you change the oil again before driving the car any further if you've been running the engine at all.

Anecdotally, my understanding is that you won't nearly be "done with it" by getting a Sniper -- they require a lot of fiddling to get dialed in and a lot of folks never do seem able to make them run right.

 

As flemming442 said...replace the fuel pump. The internal diaphragm is letting fuel pass and into your crankcase.

tc

 

I would do the fuel pump first. That is the most likely culprit.

 

alright, ordered a new pump.

 

After removing the fuel pump look for any area that is very clean that is exposed to the crankcase. You may find a tell tale clean area of where gasoline had leaked. If you do it was a pretty good size leak.

What carburetor is on it?

Good luck!!!

 

I have a Sniper on my car. I’m not sure if it’s worth the headaches.

It’s great when it works. It SUCKS when it doesn’t. There are sensors inside the throttle body that are not serviceable separately. The ECM is inside the throttle body, all the heat and vibration is transmitted to the ECM. I’m on throttle body number 3, all due to warranty issues.

My latest headache was a couple months ago, I had one dead injector. There is a well know issue with the injector plugs falling off. Seriously, as long as Holley has been making parts for the OEM, they know damn well how to design a electrical component with locking connector body’s, they choose to cheap out. A little heat shrink tubing around the connector and injector body solved the problem. There are countless people who have fixed the same concern the same way. It’s a easy fix, which I’m betting is why Holley hasn’t solved the problem. They know most automotive enthusiasts are resourceful, and will fix it themselves.

Don’t believe the “self tuning” bs. While entering a few engine parameters will get the car running, to get the most out of it professional tuning is required.

If you insist on going EFI, bite the bullet and get one of the higher end systems. The Dominator or Terminator systems are more expensive and require some additional components, but don’t suffer the shortcomings of the Sniper.

 

This is a great and helpful post for anybody considering EFI.

 

I was having trouble with the Qjet on my 75 Hurst Olds and actually gave thought to putting a Sniper on it. Then I read all the posts about Sniper and decided against it. I found a guy to rebuild my Qjet (I tried once) and he did a great great job. Very happy now.

 

I guess I'm the oddball here. I grew up with carbs and am done with them...especially at high altitude. I have SNIPERs on all my old cars and would NEVER go back. Not only do I drive them myself...I have installed dozens of them on others cars without issue.

They do take a bit of knowledge to get set up right and more importantly there are best practices that must be followed for the correct install----but they run amazing...IMHO! I do my own installs and tuning.

Good luck!