Curious if there are any members who can confirm hood clearance of an edelbrock 7111 on a 68 cutlass. I am looking at upgrading from the factory two barrel to a four, but the 7111 is fairly tall, and currently on backorder everywhere estimated ship times from what i can find are end of July to November. I found one in stock at mondello performance that had been machined down a 1/4 of an inch. I spoke with them today and he quoted something like 640 dollars with no additional work done to it. I dont have much experience with machine work prices but that seemed a little steep. So I am turning to the forum for some info/real world experience. I would hate to wait several months just to find that there is no way of making it clear the hood. I thought about trying to do some measurements of factory intake while on the car, but thought I may be able to save a few bucks on gaskets and turn to the forum.

Plan is to change out the cam, and add roller rockers when intake and carb are changed.

Already have an electric pump, fuel pressure regulator, and return plumbed in.

 

What air cleaner are you planning on? I have the taller 70S hood and the RPM with a Qjet with a stock style air cleaner I converted to dual snorkel. Remember the BBO was an option in our cars from the factory and that makes up most of the height of a rpm intake. Yeah, $640 is awful rapey for a price from the original weasel of Oldsmobile parts gouging.

 

New manifolds were $378 when available. There shouldn't be any more work to be done, if he trued up the 45 degree surface that mates to the heads. Machined 1/4" off what ?
What carb are you planning to use ? I think you would be smart to wait until a good one is available. I wouldn't buy anything from Mondello Performance, myself.

 

Thanks for the reply. I don’t have a particular air cleaner picked out. I’m open to changing from factory if needed.

I have tinkered on and off on this car since i was 15 or so. It sat stalled out for a solid 10 plus years. Went off to college didnt have the time or money to put into it. I got back into working on it last year. The last couple months i have been going down the Oldsmobile rabbit hole. I have seen several posts about Mondello and to stay away, but when i ran across the 7111 showing in stock on their website i had to call. I was considering buying one that was ported by them, but at this point unless they are the only company in the country that has a part that no alternatives exist for. they won’t see a dime of my money.

 

Thanks for the reply. They machined a 1/4 inch off the mounting surface for the carb. I would assume for clearance???

i had read to stay away. but when i saw one in stock for 389 online I had to call and inquire. Then they basically said since I was interested, it is likely one of the only ones available without a wait time, and they had done “work” it was gonna cost me.

i will backorder through a reputable company and eventually get one. This has been a stalled out project for 15 plus years. Been actively tinkering this last year. I can wait a few more months for parts. The car will drive on the factory two barrel and cruise around town fine.

as far as carbs I was looking at an edelbrock performer 600 cfm. Possibly converting over to holly sniper at some point down the road, i have some other things I want to accomplish before I put the money for a holley sniper into it. And i may find im content with a carb.

im interesting in being sure I dont wait 3 plus months and get the intake here and find I cant close my hood. I would think i can get some measurements from my two barrel intake and figure out how much taller the 7111 will be, but was hoping maybe someone else is out there with a 68 to chime in that im worrying over nothing.

 

Here is my take. I just installed 2711 manifold. I found a 70 Monte Carlo dual snorkel and ended up buying a 2 riser to get cleaner away from hei and to get 1 snorkel to go over air cond compressor. So with that the 7111 is 2 inches taller which means remove 2 inch riser and air cleaner fits under hood still. Also I just have a regular hood.

 

I think you are smart for waiting for a nice used one or getting a new one. You may want to consider a Quadrajet carb and appropriate manifold. They are 750 CFM and several companies can tune it to run with what you will have.

 

Air cleaner will fit fine with a 7111, MIGHT need a bit of a drop base but otherwise you’re hood to go. Find a good used intake if you need one sooner than later. They’re around.
Scrap the idea of ANY 600 cfm carb, too small. A Brawler or Slayer 750 is the way to go. I use a Brawler on my Dyno mules, good carbs and easy to tune. Buy a wideband for whatever carb you buy, don’t trust anybody’s “ready to go” carb.

 

thanks for the reply. If im investing in a wideband o2 sensor may just look to jump straight into the holley sniper setup. I have already replaced the fuel tank and installed sending unit with a return. I am currently running the following facet fuel pump.



It is mounted a bit high so i went this route. I will have to rework the fuel delivery setup to get a pump mounted low enough. Unless you are aware of a similar pump for higher pressure applications.

will have to purchase another fuel pressure regulator. But in the grand scheme thats not a big deal either. I just wanted to get the factory two barrel running on an electric pump reliably. While I did some research. Nice weather is here and im ready to drive this thing some.

lack of local parts availability and poor planning on my part turned a weekend project into multiple weekends and late nights wrenching after work.

But its got all the wheels on it and is drivable while i wait for edelbrock to release some more 7111 intakes.

guess its time to open the wallet and get one ordered.

 

anyone have any thoughts on this as a used manifold? Im a bit outside of my realm as far as things to look for on used parts like this. I read a bit as far as stripped or messed up holes. But would hate to try to buy this used that has something that jumps out to someone with more of a keen eye than i do.

 

It looks fine. If you are worried, tap the bolt holes, blast it and get a machine shop to plane it flat.

 

I have found a nice looking Edelbrock 7111 intake. The olds gets aligned tomorrow afternoon and Friday after work will start pulling the old two barrel intake off to replace with a 7111. I decided to go Holley Sniper for fuel delivery. Went with the master kit, then found that holley makes a sending unit for in tank pump. So the master kit will be returned to jegs in a week and a half when Im up that way. The the replacement parts should arrive today or tomorrow. Also went with Holley’s distributor, coil, and ignition box. Still need to source a good set of plug wires and i am guessing a drop base for the air cleaner. Was close to just adding a four barrel carb and eventually going efi, but decided to bite the bullet and go for it now instead of spending money on a carb and air fuel ratio gauge to tune said carb. Hopefully be up and running again by the time the weekend is over. But who knows.

im not looking forward to dropping the brand new tank I just put it, but oh well. Should have planned better in the beginning.

 

Yeah, the drop in fuel pump is the way to go. Points or HEI for plug wires?

 

Fire Core 50 for wires. They are friendly and build to your spec. I have them on 2 race cars and zero damage yet from headers.

 

Using the hyperspark setup from holley. Im guessing i may need to put larger alternator on it as well. Especially since at some point i will get a radio and some speakers in it. From what i have read i may try to get it running on factory ignition then change out to the holley stuff after.

 

The Summit 70 amp chrome 10 DN alternator worked fine for me. It came with a performance tag of 51 at idle and 82 amps at cruise. About as good as you get with the external voltage regulator alternator. I personally like the Accel spark plug wires, MSD, Summit etc are pretty similar in quality.

 

I will have to get some photos. But the intake clears with room to spare with a k&n filter assembly. I believe it is a 1 1/4 drop. And 3 inches tall. Couldn’t find a fitting for the heater hose local so it will be wednesdsy before that comes from amazon. That will give me time to wire up the fuel pump and sending unit, make some plug wires, and work in modifying the throttle cable bracket. I went with accel 8mm wires because that is what is available local. Heres hoping i wired everything correctly and it runs when i do button it up.

thanks to those that responded. By

 

Be aware that the heater hose fitting on the intake needs a restriction to prevent blowing out the heater core. The factory fittings have a 1/4” hole to reduce the coolant flow. If you use a non-restricted fitting the heater core will likely fail on the first WOT pull. Been there, done that.

 

thanks for the info. I was unaware of that. Will have to find the correct fitting or try to get the stock fitting out and get an adapter to take it to the correct size to work with a 7111 intake. I just replaced heater core not a job i would want to do again anytime soon.

 

You could use the vacuum controlled heater valve as that has the correct size orifice. Or if you have a plain hose nipple, make a restrictor. Fill it with epoxy and drill a hole, mill an insert out of some material (delrin, aluminum, etc) and drill a hole in the center. Or look for a factory nipple that has a restriction in it. There are many ways to address this.

 

Ended up getting an adapter to use a regular hose barb. I then drilled a hole in a copper cap for water line, and inserted that in the hose. Has a nice tight fit. I just found out that holleys in tank fuel pump line is not 3/8. You would think they would use the same size line as their efi requires. Going to see if it will seal on the 6an hose if not will have to figure something out there.

 

Got it mostly back together. Waiting on a higher output alternator, throttle cable bracket, and some stuff to change out the wiring from the battery to the alternator. Ready to try to figure out the sniper efi and fire it up. Hoping to see parts tomorrow and Thursday. Then will try to tidy up the wiring in the engine bay a little more.

 

It fired Thursday. Ran decent while warming up then hit operating temp and i believe was getting some electrical interference. The handheld would blink or sensor data drop out momentarily and then die. It would fire back up and do the same thing almost instantly. I was wondering if my routing was decent or not. Im guessing it wasn't. I ended up pulling all the wiring Thursday evening. Began researching, and decided to change wiring routing, add a tape that protects from rf interference , i had left the tach signal wire rolled up to add a tach at a later date as i didnt have a pin removal tool. The other wires were previously cut short but left enough wire to add it back in should i ever need to. These wires are now all pulled out. Since i got a pin removal tool yesterday. Wiring is just about buttoned up. It fired today got to temp and continued to idle and run as it should.

has anyone installed a sniper and factory throttle cable? If you have what bracket did you use? I am considering trying to cut snd weld the factory one. I had ordered one from jegs last week but i just got around to trying to install it to find out it will not work as i had hoped. The linkage sits out to far.