Hi all. I bought my 87 a year ago and it had not long had a new Edelbrock carb fitted. The engine is a goodwrench crate motor with around 27k on it.

I'm not really a carb guy so ive never pulled one apart. I have set the idle mixture screws with a vacuum gauge and that's right in the green now. I pulled all 8 plugs and they were disgusting. I'd expect to smell fuel on these cars but I can tell its running rich as its stronger than I'd like.

Timing is set at 8 degrees. if it's been standing overnight it will generally crank over and fire up really quick then promptly die. Then I have to crank it over for about 5 seconds and pump the pedal once or twice and it fires. Hold the throttle down for about 20 seconds until it will idle.

Once it warmed up and been driven it will restart fine. Feels like it's a bit lumpy and hesitant going slow. Feels better at speed. If you shut the car off and leave it a few hours its a bit hard to start also.

Any advice appreciated.

 

Read the manual that came with the carb. It literally tells you how to tune it. Or DuckDuckGo it for digital copy.

 

There was nothing about the carburetor that came with the car unfortunately. I guess the garage that fitted it didn't put the box or manual in the car

 

Buy a tuning kit... You probably need to drop the key sizes... Your symptoms say it's rich all over the board... I would see what is in there and drop 2 sizes.... Then test it.

The kits have several jet sizes, rods, and a few other parts... Well worth it. You have to get the fuel metering right.

 

I hope you are not running the '87 fuel pump without a pressure regulator. That pump will put out way too much pressure for any carburetor. It was designed for fuel injection.

Edelbrock carbs do not like fuel pressure over 5 psi. Read the manual for the carb you have. The part number for the carb is on the front lower pad by the mount stud on the passenger side.

Do all of the basic set up per the manual. That will give you a good baseline to start with. A choke that is stuck in the closed position will also give you symptoms like your are having. Good luck and let us know what you find. Edelbrocks are great carbs. They get a bad rap because people do not know how to tune them correctly. I have been running a 600 cfm #1406 on my daily driver for over 20 years. After some fine tuning with a wideband AFR gauge, I have it dialed in perfect.