This is a pic if you wanna see it:

About the TB:

Its a BBK unit. I like the way it matches the TPI, it really fits the appearance of the TPI better than the factory TB, the roughness of the casting is just like the plenum. It would need alot of cleanup on the outside to polish it, so for those in the polishing mood you should be aware of that.

BBK gives you screws for the TB. The 4 allen head bolts to hold it to the plenum dont really match what I have on the car. I havent gotten around to putting 12pt stainless ARP's there yet to match the rest of the engine and intake (I will, soon), so I wanted to just use the factory bolts. Well, the lower 2 dont fit (theirs do fit though, theres no shoulder on the bolts). One was tight. The other, no way. BBK machines a circular area into the material of the TB for the bolt. One was not centered on the hole, it was offset. I stuck the thing in a mill and made it big enough to fit the factory bolts and made sure the ARP's are gonna fit. Didnt take too much. I think if it had been centered, it would have worked.

The top plate we have is factory, its painted to match the rest of the plenum (Pontiac blue and silver). Since we wanted to keep that plate, threw the BBK plate on the old 48mm TB. Doesnt fit. Its a little wider than the stocker. Also had to grind an alignment pin off the stock plate, theres no hole provided in the BBK TB. I would have drilled the hole, but I didnt want to hit any air passages that may have been lurking underneath.

The arrangement on the TPS side is IMO nicer than factory. The 2 stupid stands on the factory setup just look cheezy and collect dirt. This should stay cleaner.

When I first got it, the built in airfoil was rather horrible looking. I did a fair amount of grinding to it to clean it up, then polished it all. I think they could have done a little better. While I was at it, I cleaned up the holes to the IAC and the breather setup, in hopes of avoiding the dreaded whistle I keep hearing about BBK TB's.

Then, I installed it. When I first got it, checked it all out. Opened the blades, felt fine. Checked shaft play, fine. Everything was fine. Then I messed with it and cleaned it up like I wanted, still fine. Install it on the car. Fire car up. Open throttle, sticks in place. WTF??? Shut car off, throttle works fine. Fire it up, sticks. WTF??? So, I call BBK. 4 times. Send emails, 3 times. Send a fax. They dont want to talk to you. Their customer service line wants you to leave a message, theres no human to talk to. They say they will contact you within 24 hours. More like 96. I call again, get transferred to someone human, she transfers me to the person I need to talk to, that person hangs up. I call again, answering machine. I call again, finally talk to first person again, tell her I live 14 miles away from them and they really dont want me to come down there and handle this in person. Get transferred, and finally get somewhere. They want me to send it back, receipt, return authorization number, etc. Pack it up in the box, send off. Wait. Wait. Wait. Wait. WTF? Its been over 1.5 months, no word. I call, leave a message. Nothing. Call again, leave a message. Nothing. Still waiting for a return call. About 2 weeks later, TB arrives in the mail, assumably fixed. When we got it the first time, there was paint inside the back half of the bores, looked like primer. We cleaned that up. Theres paint in there again, just around the outside of the plates and around the bores right there. Dunno why, left it alone this time. Note in box says something about "TB repaired" and thats it. My dad is curious what exactly they did to fix it, as he didnt really want to take this off again and make another attempt to have it fixed. Calls, leaves messages, nothing. Typical. It looked before like there may have been some slight misalignment of the shaft in the middle, and one of the blades looked slightly off in the bore. Doesnt look that way anymore. Dunno if that was a problem or not.

So, today we install it. Guess what? Its fixed! YEAY! So, its on the car and ready and in proper working order. Finally.

Oddities:
When I first fired the car up, of course the throttle plate opening was totally wrong. When they ship it, the plates are closed. Open the plates up to the correct amount. Theres alot of air sucking type noise coming from the TB area. I check the bellows clamp, tight. I check the ported air connections we arent using for caps, they are all blocked off. Check bolts, all tight. After a while, the noise goes away all by itself. Weird.

BBK puts blue loctite on the throttle/idle screw. Why, I dont know. Makes it hard to adjust. The screw itself sucks. Its a round head screw with a 3mm allen head in the center. VERY hard to get the stupid wrench aligned into the hole. That screw is going bye-bye when I get the chance, will replace it with something else. I think a flat head bolt would have been a better idea, and maybe something bigger than 3mm would make sense.

So, in short:
The TB is pretty nice. Needs some cleanup, but nothing bad. I suggest you leave the paint on the TB blades and bores, I dont know what difference it could possibly make but I am not touching the stuff on mine. Its working right, I aint messing with it.

BBK's customer service sucks. They really do not want to talk to you. I never got a response if they even got my throttle body in for repair (which was a concern, it took so long I didnt even know if they had it or not) and we have no idea if the paint needs to be there or not, nor do we know what the 'fix' was. Probably never will know. Basically if you are looking for or need customer service, forget it. And they really are close to me, I used to drive by their building on the way to a friend's house. I'm not sure I want to pay them a visit to find out what they did to the TB, probably would land me in jail or something.

So in the end, I have mixed feelings. I like the TB. I do not like the company. I'd have a hard time recommending them to someone else. I havent driven the car yet or made any sort of performance comparisons, but no doubt the K+N sitting on the end of the air intake tube is sucking more air in than before, even at idle. If that makes any sort of real world performance difference, I cant say. You know how some cars make all sorts of noise but dont go nowhere... I'll leave the performance change results for a different time.

 

Thanks for the insight, I'll be sure to watch myself when I get a new TB.

 

i will not be buying anything from BBK.....

 

I got the 58mm TB from BBK as well. Perfomance is aspected. That sound you hear when You first start it up, I got it too. The damn thing whistles loud as $hit! But after it warms up just a little it goes away. WFT is right. I left the paint on mine. It seems to work fine, but does make noise.

 

did the TB give ya some power??

 

Dunno. Took the car out for a drive tonight, about the only good thing I can say about BBK themselves is apparently after all the ignoring they did, they did fix the throttle body. The derriere dyno says no significant difference. Not real surprising result I think, but I think I do have to mess with the prom a little to make things ideal again, should have hooked up my scanner on the drive... oh well.

 

sorry to bring from the dead but i judt got my bbk and its also loud as ****. its a used 58mm but makes an aweful whining noise from the blades. didnt give it enough time to warm up really but i wonder if its associated with all bbk's or if mines just broken. i guess ill let it warm up tomorrow and well see...

 

i have one too...i think it sounds good. it is 1000cfm compared to the 750cfm or whatever stock is...

no complaints with mine. bought it used and love it.

 

My Holley 58mm is whining/howling BAD! What can be done to fix this. It's is louder than my exhaust - which is really loud...

 

Back from the dead for the 2nd time. Anyways I have the Holley 58mm throttle body on my car and it work just fine. I did have to grind down the "tab" on my TPS to clear the the throttle body but that was it.

 

The noise you hear is the IAC letting air pass through in open loop. In close loop the noise goes away. The 52mm and 58mm does the same thing.

When I change from the 52mm to the 58mm, on the dyno it was rich. Tuned it on the dyno and saw 3hp and 10tq. Was it worth it?

370rwhp-401rwtq(52mm) 373rwhp-411rwtq(58mm)

At the track with the 52mm 12.56@109.22. With the 58mm 12.41@112.24