Hey guys, ive been away for some time due to a rather unfortunate car accident. At least it was a honda and not my camaro that was wrecked. Anyway, i had some questions about the edlebrock TBI to MPFI conversion kit. Ive been asking them questions about it for awhile but they stopped answering my e-mails, lol.

First off, has anyone used it? I've been trying to get some accounts from people but I haven't been able to find anyone. Also, has anyone heard anything good or bad about it? From what i could gather, it seems to have it limits. They offer it with only 19 or 29 pound "pico" injectors. Edelbrock says they're made by Magnetti Marelli. My biggest problem is that 19 is too mall for anything over about 300 horses and i have no plans to build a small block that needs 29 pound injectors. The kit uses lt1 rails and fuel pressure regulator. How many extra horses could you squeeze outta the kit with an AFPR?

BTW, please dont crucify me for CONTEMPLATING switching to multi-port.

 

i wouldnt worry about being crucified for that, there are plenty of others on here who should be on the tpi board too.
im half kidding.

 

i have no comments about the edelbrock unit, but your concerns seem legit to me. but the carb manifold, drilled for injection, with a dry TBI is a proven combo.

the good news is there are other options for you.

holley makes a MPFI system, about the same price as the edelbrock. also, from my pricng with the holley replacement parts book, and summitonline i think you can piece together the whole commander 950 computer system for about $1000. then you can use any 4bbl manifold, drill it for the injectors of your choice, and then make fuel rails acordingly. then the last thing you need is the apropriatly sized dry TB for you aplication. you can even use a standard TPI or LT1 TB, with a 90* elbow for this solution.

BTW, WTF are you thinking

 

lol, i knew i would rile somedbody up with that. Seriously, i was just thinking about it. To be perfectly honest, i dont feel like doing the entire harness swap necessary for converion to tpi. I need to stay emissions legal so an aftermarket fuel system is out. The reason i was looking at the edelbrock unit was because it uses your existing harness and computer but is pretty inflexible when it comes to modification. I dont know. Im just trying to gather options and possibilities so when i get the money i need, i can get my car back on the road as soon as possible. Thanks for the responses!

 

man you didnt rile me up, i was just joshn you a little. a few people have been giving a kinda hard time on here cause im totaly loyal to tbi. i was just taking the oppertunity to get at em a little. your idea sounds great wish you the best of luck!

 

I wrote them awhile back on this, they said it would not work for a TBI car.

 

thats odd, they told me it would.

 

Hey, sounds good to me. I have been wanting to do that to my car. I am tired of only having two holes to suck air through and I don't want to carb it. I haven't heard of anyone running the system, so I can't get a good idea of how it performs. With that in mind it seems that it would definately not be ran into on the street too often. Edelbrock says that it (4 barrel sys) is for 1986 and earlier carb engines. I can't figure out why. Maybe it is because of emissions. If that is the case then if you aren't worried about emissions it should fit all of our cars on up to the 92'models, right?

Anyhow here is the system I was thinking about getting. It eliminates the need for a laptop in the car.

 

i thought about the MPFI for a long while but the stand alone unit and having to tapinto the stock incluster and fiddle F*** with the mess of wires in my car i decided against it. just sticking with the tbi will get the holley replacement someday. and tpi's i heard they run out of air at high rpms.

 

it is probably because the intake manifold is for pre 87 heads just elongate the center holes, and i bet it works with no problems.

 

I wasn't referring to the 4 bbl system. The conversion unit uses the stock throttle body, computer and the harness with just minor modification. It still sucks through only two holes, but if you use a 454 TB, and bore out the holes in the manifold to match, you shouldn't have a problem sucking in enough air. As i mentioned before, it's the lack of fuel injector options that is the problem. But if you dont have to worry about emissions, the 4bbl system should work alright.
I will admit, im starting to lean back into the TBI camp. Im getting pissed off with the lack of options involved with this conversion kit and TBI, when setup properly, seems to be able to hold its own ground.

 

That is a thought, but I don't have the vortec heads though. I have the older style heads, even though it is a new 2002 motor. Make any sense? Does the stock 305 TBI intake (1990) have the same bolt pattern as the older pre86 intakes? That is probably the biggest question I should be asking about that.

 

okay, i e-mailed edelbrock, AGAIN, about being able to install the kit in our cars and they said no. This is the reason they gave.

"Our system will not work on a car manifold or ECM. The reason is the distributor uses a much smaller diameter distributor in a truck
than in a car. Our unit is only EO legal on a 350 and that is the only chip we provide. Most chip companies have a lot of trouble doing a chip for the MPFI compared to for a TBI."

Now, can someone please translate what this dumb!@# was trying to say.

 

I have this conversion but I'll be honest in that I am not using it the way it was intended. I have it in a supercharged situation using a 749 ecm controlling everything. So far it seems to be a nice kit and have been happy with everything that came with it.

I don't think it works with cars in the fact that camaros use a different ecm then trucks and they probably did not burn proms for that application. Not to say you could not make it work if you can do your own prom burning.

I can try and answer any question for you that I can.

Chris

 

So are you thinking that there is NO 4brl MPFI system out there that will work with our cars even if we have a 350? I am wanting to do this pretty bad but I sure don't want a bunch of computer problems. I thought that they had their own computer with the system.

P.S. My car has the emissions removed too.

 

The system that you pictured in your previous post will work in your car as far as running the engine, now when it comes to keeping the instruments working properly, you will have to find the wires that run each one (ie. oil pressure, water temp, alternator), and leave them hooked to the engine. The rest you won't need. The tps, iac, o2 and the iat sensors would hook up to the ecm supplied with the mpfi kit. You would have to disconnect the check engine light because it would be useless. I know there must be more to it than that but it sounds like it would work. Also don't forget you would also have to change the fuel pump also.

Steve

 

guys the kit im talking about reuses our 2bbl TBI throttle body.

 

Right the kit you are talking about uses the stock tbi computer. You just cut the two tbi plugs off and then wire in eight plugs for the new injectors. The tbi then becomes just an air meter with no injectors on it. Everything else hooks back up like stock for the most part.

 

I would like to know if anyone has used this 4brl system and what kind of difference it has made. Does anyone know or know anyone that has used it on a thirdgen and the difference it has made? I bet it will make a ton of difference.

 

any idea why the kit wouldn't work on our car with the computer? If they're saying the CHIP wont work, well, hell, i knew that. I dont imagine it would be real hard to program a new one, though. And what the hell was that about the distributor? I thought the TBI cars and trucks had the same ignition. Besides the kit doesn't modify the ignition so I dont see how the kit could be specific towards a certain type of ignition system. Edelbrock tried to tell me it would be nearly 'impossible' for any chip tuners to properly tune a chip for this car. Give me a break. Any ideas as to what the hell there problem is?

Hey iroczrockz, there is an article in Super Chevy, i believe, where they installed the 4bbl tbi system on a car. They actually lost power but that was because they were still using the old cam that didn't have fuel injection friendly specs. The only place i'd see the 4bbl system is in high rpm situations.

 

what if you were to switch to the 747 ECM, not a hard switch at all on our cars, then you would have the exact computer that the edelbrock kit uses.

also, holley's kits uses a stand alone computer, not reusing 80's tech and trying to make a chip that works. that might be a viable option. use the holley computer for fuel and spark. and the stock computer for gauges.

 

I had a buddy with the Commander 950 on a 350. Once he got the bitch tuned right (took weeks) it was a great system. But for the price you can make a good old TBI setup flow well enough for what you'll want.

 

If you wanted to use it on a third gen I would put the kit on then swap your ecm to a 730 like a TPI. Then tuning it would be a much easier. There is no difference in distributors between a car and a truck I don't know what the heck they were talking about.

 

yes, i don't see any reasons it wouldn't physicly fit the motor, i assume the reason they say it is only for trucks, has to do with the chip they give, since the f-cars use a 8746 computer, and the trucks use the 747, the reason they say it won't work is probably for that reason. the 747 swap to the car would not be very hard to do though.