Hey guys, I just bought a 1985 camaro it came with a 350 sml block
I have a friend of mine working on it, but it has a rochester quadjet with numbers "17084201" on it. I was debating on rebuilding or buying a holley. When i went to the auto part store he said he would recommend buying a new holly. Can y'all help me? I don't know a lot about cars...lol I am more of a computer geek but my friends a mechanic. So any feedback would be great.

 

Welcome aboard thirdgen.org.

Rebuild the carb, assuming it needs it. It's a great street performance carb, and any Holley would involve expense and tweaking to even come close to what the q-jet will do for you for basically nothing.

 

any idea where i would get the right rebuild kit? i went to O'rileys and thats when he told me to buy a new carb LOL. And thanks for the welcome, and not crackin on me for not knowing a whole hell of alot but thats partly why i got this car, so i can learn.

 

Any parts store will be able to get you a kit. You'll also need a gallon jug of carb and cold parts cleaner for soaking things in, and compressed air or a few cans of spray carb cleaner for flushing things out.

 

the thing that confuses me about this car is they took and completely un hooked everything computer related in this car - the carb i have on right now is electric and its not even hooked up lol. So carbs are rated of cfm? what rateing is mine?

 

Ouch, step #1 then is to get everything hooked back up. Some people never cease to amaze me, pulling stuff off they have no clue what it does, assuming it's all "smog crap" and removing it will automatically make the car run better. It simply isn't true in this case.

If you have a digital camera, you might want to post some pictures of what it looks like. Might be able to help decide whether it's salvageable, or a lost cause. Even if totally hacked, it might make more sense to find an unhacked harness and computer (not that hard to do) and put it back the way it is supposed to be. On the engine swap forum, there's a sticky in the top section of the forum about a Father/son swap, and that's basically what they did.

Oh, don't worry about the "CFM" rating of your q-jet. It's self-adjusting, and won't be too much or too little. There's a tech article linked from the thirdgen.org homepage about getting the most out of your computer carb, wouldn't be a bad idea for you to look through it and see if your carb is fully capable.

 

okay imma head to bed for now. Ill post some pics tomorrow lol. I paid 800 bucks for the car and it runs lol. So i wont be out of much. From what my friend says - the only thing electric is the carb. I have some pics from my phone dont know if they will help let me psot em tho.

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I think the engine came out of on old firebird or trans am

 

Yeah, you've got some things unplugged there that are going to make it real unhappy, and it looks like they've got a vacuum pot on the distributor. Is your Check Engine light on? If not, does it have a burnt-out bulb?

 

Hell if i know LOL! It drives fine- has some trbl starting up when its cold!
Any recommendations?
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I dont even know where to start with this car LMAO

 

That carb needs the computer to tell it how to adjust the mixture, based on feedback from the sensors. Without the computer doing its job you'll be running pig rich. It looks like they've half-converted it to an older non-computer setup. You've got a bit of a choice whether to get the computer working again, or to completely convert to a non-computer setup. How much effort it'll take to do either will depend on what else they've done to that poor thing.

 

i wouldnt mind a non computer setup - i was wondering why it smelled so rich lol- you think thats bad you should see th 1/2 cherry bombs on the exhaust- left tailpip is only one with cat converter and cut off tail - the right has a cherry bomb LMAO
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I dont believe anything in the engine is hooked to the computer

 

That was a good deal for 800 dollars! i would personally get the holley (600-750 cfm) unless you are willing to send your carb out to get rebuild or have the time and pateince to learn how to rebuild these carbs. They are very complicated and very "moody" carbs as i have learned, but most professional mechanics will tell you they are the best street carb out there and will perform just as good or better than the best of them. Holleys are bolt on and go, so its easy and will only take a couple hours to put on your engine plus they look better. all you wil need is fuel lines to put the holley on since you already have a square bore manifold plus youll get more hood clearance without the carb spacer on there

 

yea and it has iroc-z rims on it so im pretty sure i got my buck back

 

BTW never trust a parts salesman they only want your money plus they will tell you tons of bs about q-jets that are just ridiculious.

 

Yea, so any specific holley u have in mind? He showe dme one for 199 and one for 259(chrome and proformance)

 

They'll bolt on and go, but it'll take just as much work (and the same type of work) to make one work optimally as it will with any other carb.

 

Ok, lets get started then shall we?

You have a computer controlled carb, and what looks like a non computer controlled distributor. You need to replace one to get it to match the other one.

So, on the carb -

Yellow circle - Choke thermostat. Should have a green wire with a white connector on the end, plugged onto the metal tang. Check to see if it is.

Dark blue circle - Mixture control solenoid. Find the two pin connector that's supposed to go there and plug it in.

Teal circle - Throttle position sensor. Find the flat 3 pin connector and connect it.

Red circle - That's a vacuum port. It needs to be plugged, since it looks like your brake booster is connected at the back of the carb, and the PCV is connected below this. I forget what this one SHOULD be connected to (EVAP?) but don't just leave it open.

Now if you do all this, you're going to use your electronic system. So you'll need to make sure you have a good working O2 sensor, and you'll need to buy a new computer controlled distributor. There are a few out there available, ~$150.

2nd choice is to go non-cc. This would be my pick. I'd go by a junkyard and find an early '80's Cutlass or the like, with an LG4 305 engine. Find one with the same looking carb, but without the two plugs (mixture control and throttle position). Find one that's DIRTY. That means no monkey headed "mechanic" has tinkered with it, and is the reason the car is in the JY in the first place
That'll cost ya maybe $40 at the yard. Bolt it on as is, or you can rebuild it if you want. I'd try it as is first. You'll find it runs MUCH cleaner. Tweak from there.

 

Wow holleys for 200!!!??? where the hell do you live? chrome would either be the hp series or street avenger and the chrome coating doesnt give any more performance than a dichromate coating. The only diffrences between them is they have a few more things to make it more user freindly and better for the street. Like electric chokes and vacuum secondaries that you can add diffrent springs to to get better mileage or performance. all holleys are basically the same but you gotta pick a good CFM range for your car or they will run like sh*t. I'd say grab a 670cfm street avenger you siad you can get it for $259 so thats a killer deal i wish i could find a holley for that much edelbrocks are even more!. With the holley you won't need to change distributors either! Q-jets are the best for street but it's alot of work for someone who doesnt know much about them. buy the holley then get a book on q-jets then go buy the old q-jet from the j-yard and take your time to rebuild it. Then when your done put it on and see if you like it more, you should get more mileage, and when you step on it the huge secondaries will really get the car going. But if your a novice just grab the holley their easy.

 

An early 80s Cutlass south of the border is going to have an E4ME.

 

Really? I thought only 3rd gen F-bodies got the cc-qjets. I'll be damned.
Alright, then late '70s one or something. Loads and loads of Q-jets around. An LG4 engine with a carb (non-cc qjet) would be easiest to set up.

Most holleys are squarebore, so you'd need a new intake manifold.

You could find a spreadbore carb, but a used Q-jet would be cheapest.

 

If you're going to spend money on a carb, don't waste it on a Street Avenger. Or an 1850, which is probably what the parts store was going to sell you.

$'s to donuts says the torque converter clutch lock-up isn't hooked up. That's one advantage of restoring the computer system, that would then work properly. With a non-CC set-up, you're going to have to rig that up some other way.

 

All the LG4s had E4ME's, didn't matter if it was in a Camaro, Firebird, Monte Carlo, or even a Corvette.
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That's a Performer manifold, it'll mount either carb.

 

Well, my '84 G20 van, VIN code "H", had a non-CC q-jet.

 

He has a square bore, He's using one of those spread bore to square bore spacers.

 

Good eyes guys, good eyes. Didn't even notice the intake manifold.

Assuming he's got an auto tranny, and can find any of those wiring harnesses there, then keeping cc is probably easiest. Just needs a cc-distributor.

The other choice is to get a pure non-cc carb of your favorite flavor/price, then tweaking TC lockup.

 

I would like a non computer car to start with - easier to fix/diagnose. It already has a mechanical fuel pump in the engine. So cant i just get a holley manual choke and plug and play?

 

It's the same process to fix/diagnose a CCC setup as it is a non-CCC. Without knowing what you've got right now, anything you do is going to involve more playing than plugging.

 

If you get the holley you will need new fuel lines and maybe a new pvc line. You will also need the connection that goes to the tranny but i know nothing about that IF you have a auto. and get an electric choke carb since you already have the wire there anyways. The guy at the parts store will tell you what you need for that, it should be pretty cheap. also you will have to lose the carb spacer. I would say get the holley if you dont know anything about q-jets especially the CC q-jet.

 

From the pictures and descriptions, I wouldn't make that assumption.

You need to do something about that breather, too. Looks like there's an open hose going from the driver's side breather to the carb base - there should be a PCV valve in there.

 

The cheesy looking breather on the drivers side is probably the valve.

 

Okay guys got some advice from a friend imma stick with rochester but get one form a junkyard or someones backyard out of a 1973-1980 car and he said he'll rebuild it for me and run me a hot wire too the electric choke. Sound good?

 

I'm guessing that's just the braided hose connectors.

The wire for the electric choke may still be around somewhere, but it might be just as easy to run a new one.

You need to rig something up to lock up the torque converter clutch.

 

Not the connectors, the breather itself.

 

He never even answered - is this a 5 speed car or automatic?

 

auto