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Help! Not running right after rebuild

23K views 267 replies 27 participants last post by  Vincent 
#1 ·
I rebuilt my 2.2 motor for my 1970 GT about 3 1/2 years ago (2015/2016), which you can read about I this thread:

https://www.opelgt.com/forums/6f-engine-rebuilding/56650-2-2-motor-need-rebuild.html

Unfortunately, due to life circumstances (having kids, changing jobs, moving, building, etc) I am just now getting back to working on the car. And even more unfortunately, I have several things that I need to tackle in order to be able to enjoy my car again.

Car Overview:

1970 GT, automatic transmission, 2.2 motor with dual 45 DCOE carbs, custom ISKY camshaft (specs: intake duration 222 w .455 lift, exhaust duration 228 w/ .448 lift, lobe separation of 112) 1975 distributor, pertronix electronic ignition module.

Carbs:

Weber 45 DCOE 152 purchased from Pierce Manifolds. They jetted the carbs based on the specs of the motor rebuild and transmission of the vehicle.

Motor: 2016

The motor was rebuilt without issue and went through the 20-30 minute break-in period at initial start-up, which took place in the April/May 2016 timeframe, also without issue. I took the car to a shop to have it detailed and buffed out after sitting for a while in various shops and my garage for a year or more. While driving it back to my house from the detail shop, I gave it some throttle to pass a car and it stumbled. I let off the throttle, feathered the pedal a bit and all returned to normal. I drove it a few more time for short distances (10-20 miles at a time at most). Then one day while out for a drive, I tried to take off from a 4 way stop and the stumble was there again. However, this time, i couldn't get it to go away. I called the guy who built the motor and he came out to do a house call. Compression was 180+ in all 4 cylinders, he camera scoped the cylinders and all looked good. We got the motor to "run" by it was rough and sounded off. We used a temp gun to shoot the header pipes and #4 was colder than the rest. By this time, it was time to move and start building a home and the GT went in to storage.

Motor: 2019

Last week my dad come over to give me a hand firing the car up for the first time to see what we could figure out with the motor. First, we adjusted all the valves, zero lash then a 1/2 to 3/4 turn. I recently changed to a new carter 2-4psi fuel pump and ran new Gates Barricade fuel lines. The tank was drained and filled 1/2 up with zero ethanol fuel. Brand new Optima Red Top battery. We finally got the motor to fire, but unfortunately it is still experiencing the same, if not worse issues. It is still running cold on #4, based on thermal temp gun shooting the exhaust header pipes. We performed a compression test, all cylinders were between 180-185. We verified spark at each plug. The motor would only start & "run" with the distributor turned counter-clockwise until the vacuum can was hitting the motor. Additionally, the car was backfiring out of the carbs at seemingly random intervals. Cylinder #1 was the primary culprit of backfiring, but the engine almost sounded as if it was cross-firing. I went and picked up a new cap and rotor, and the cross firing didn't seem as bad but it still happened. I have both my original pertronix unit and a new pertronix III with new matching coil. We swapped out both units and coils to see if that made a difference, but it didn't change the result. We finally walked away from it because as we were giving it throttle, we returned the throttle to the closed position and the engine started to surge and take off to higher rpms. In fact with the throttle closed to the idle position it surged to nearly 3500rpms and remained there. We shut the engine off and called it a day.

Interior:

After 15 months in storage I went to pick the car up from the storage garage. As I took the car cover off and opened the door, my heart sunk.....nearly the entire interior of the car had molded over. Carpet, seat belts, dash components, even rubber hoses in the engine bay. Luckily, when I redid the interior of the car years ago, I selected marine grade vinyl for my seats, door panels, headliner, etc, and none of that stuff was affected by the mold. So I've currently got the interior out of my car and will be ordering a carpet kit from OGTS to redo all the carpet.

Metal:

When first doing the dual carb conversion, I had a guy offer to help me out with making room for them in the engine bay. Well, unfortunately with all the stuff going on, I wasn't totally aware of what had been done until i have recently been going over the car to see what needs to happen. This guy "helped me out" by doing a hack-job in the engine bay and using spray foam and the black spray paint to fill in some gaps! Additionally, he had taken the dash out and center console pieces...but when we tried reassembly, he didn't get them lined up properly and the only was he could get them to stay was to put some screws through them in new screw locations. So needless to say, I need to remove the entire dash and console pieces to ensure that they are put back in correctly; plus it wouldn't hurt to check behind the dash area for mold growth to make sure i don't have that in the car.

After taking the carpet out, I realized that I have a rust hole under the package area behind the center console and some rust in the drivers side rocker area. The previous owner had done some metal work in the floor board area of drivers side and added fiberglass rocker skirts to the exterior. In my opinion, those two areas need to be repaired prior to the interior going back in the car.

Conclusion:

So that's where I'm at with my beloved GT. I'm overwhelmed and not sure what to do with the motor. The interior and metal work need addressed, then I'll need to see what else may need some love after the car sitting for almost 5 years in total. And then, I figure since I'm going to have the whole car apart for this stuff, I might as well take the time to address some things I've had on a wish list, like A/C. But first thing first and that's getting the motor running on all 4 cylinders.

My little boys just want to hear the car run and go for a ride, and I'd love to be able to make the happen for them and myself sooner than later.

Any and all help is greatly appreciated! PM me for my number, in the event anyone is willing to talk to help me figure this out. I live just north of Indianapolis if any fellow Opelers may be in the area.

Eric
 
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#2 ·
My first guess on the engine progressively running worse is that the carbs are getting out of sync. Often the cheap clamps will slip gradually and the 2 carbs are not in sync any more. The have to be almost perfectly sync'd, or it will not run well. Read upon sync'ing Weber side drafts.
 
#3 ·
Do you still have your Weber 38 dges and intake? If so mite be starting out with a simple down draft system.
 
#5 ·
I rebuilt my 2.2 motor for my 1970 GT about 3 1/2 years ago (2015/2016), which you can read about I this thread:

https://www.opelgt.com/forums/6f-engine-rebuilding/56650-2-2-motor-need-rebuild.html

Unfortunately, due to life circumstances (having kids, changing jobs, moving, building, etc) I am just now getting back to working on the car. And even more unfortunately, I have several things that I need to tackle in order to be able to enjoy my car again.

Car Overview:

1970 GT, automatic transmission, 2.2 motor with dual 45 DCOE carbs, custom ISKY camshaft (specs: intake duration 222 w .455 lift, exhaust duration 228 w/ .448 lift, lobe separation of 112) 1975 distributor, pertronix electronic ignition module.

Carbs:

Weber 45 DCOE 152 purchased from Pierce Manifolds. They jetted the carbs based on the specs of the motor rebuild and transmission of the vehicle.

Motor: 2016

The motor was rebuilt without issue and went through the 20-30 minute break-in period at initial start-up, which took place in the April/May 2016 timeframe, also without issue. I took the car to a shop to have it detailed and buffed out after sitting for a while in various shops and my garage for a year or more. While driving it back to my house from the detail shop, I gave it some throttle to pass a car and it stumbled. I let off the throttle, feathered the pedal a bit and all returned to normal. I drove it a few more time for short distances (10-20 miles at a time at most). Then one day while out for a drive, I tried to take off from a 4 way stop and the stumble was there again. However, this time, i couldn't get it to go away. I called the guy who built the motor and he came out to do a house call. Compression was 180+ in all 4 cylinders, he camera scoped the cylinders and all looked good. We got the motor to "run" by it was rough and sounded off. We used a temp gun to shoot the header pipes and #4 was colder than the rest. By this time, it was time to move and start building a home and the GT went in to storage.

Motor: 2019

Last week my dad come over to give me a hand firing the car up for the first time to see what we could figure out with the motor. First, we adjusted all the valves, zero lash then a 1/2 to 3/4 turn. I recently changed to a new carter 2-4psi fuel pump and ran new Gates Barricade fuel lines. The tank was drained and filled 1/2 up with zero ethanol fuel. Brand new Optima Red Top battery. We finally got the motor to fire, but unfortunately it is still experiencing the same, if not worse issues. It is still running cold on #4, based on thermal temp gun shooting the exhaust header pipes. We performed a compression test, all cylinders were between 180-185. We verified spark at each plug. The motor would only start & "run" with the distributor turned counter-clockwise until the vacuum can was hitting the motor. Additionally, the car was backfiring out of the carbs at seemingly random intervals. Cylinder #1 was the primary culprit of backfiring, but the engine almost sounded as if it was cross-firing. I went and picked up a new cap and rotor, and the cross firing didn't seem as bad but it still happened. I have both my original pertronix unit and a new pertronix III with new matching coil. We swapped out both units and coils to see if that made a difference, but it didn't change the result. We finally walked away from it because as we were giving it throttle, we returned the throttle to the closed position and the engine started to surge and take off to higher rpms. In fact with the throttle closed to the idle position it surged to nearly 3500rpms and remained there. We shut the engine off and called it a day.

Interior:

After 15 months in storage I went to pick the car up from the storage garage. As I took the car cover off and opened the door, my heart sunk.....nearly the entire interior of the car had molded over. Carpet, seat belts, dash components, even rubber hoses in the engine bay. Luckily, when I redid the interior of the car years ago, I selected marine grade vinyl for my seats, door panels, headliner, etc, and none of that stuff was affected by the mold. So I've currently got the interior out of my car and will be ordering a carpet kit from OGTS to redo all the carpet.

Metal:

When first doing the dual carb conversion, I had a guy offer to help me out with making room for them in the engine bay. Well, unfortunately with all the stuff going on, I wasn't totally aware of what had been done until i have recently been going over the car to see what needs to happen. This guy "helped me out" by doing a hack-job in the engine bay and using spray foam and the black spray paint to fill in some gaps! Additionally, he had taken the dash out and center console pieces...but when we tried reassembly, he didn't get them lined up properly and the only was he could get them to stay was to put some screws through them in new screw locations. So needless to say, I need to remove the entire dash and console pieces to ensure that they are put back in correctly; plus it wouldn't hurt to check behind the dash area for mold growth to make sure i don't have that in the car.

After taking the carpet out, I realized that I have a rust hole under the package area behind the center console and some rust in the drivers side rocker area. The previous owner had done some metal work in the floor board area of drivers side and added fiberglass rocker skirts to the exterior. In my opinion, those two areas need to be repaired prior to the interior going back in the car.

Conclusion:

So that's where I'm at with my beloved GT. I'm overwhelmed and not sure what to do with the motor. The interior and metal work need addressed, then I'll need to see what else may need some love after the car sitting for almost 5 years in total. And then, I figure since I'm going to have the whole car apart for this stuff, I might as well take the time to address some things I've had on a wish list, like A/C. But first thing first and that's getting the motor running on all 4 cylinders.

My little boys just want to hear the car run and go for a ride, and I'd love to be able to make the happen for them and myself sooner than later.

Any and all help is greatly appreciated! PM me for my number, in the event anyone is willing to talk to help me figure this out. I live just north of Indianapolis if any fellow Opelers may be in the area.

Eric
First, let's eliminate the obvious. Is this a hydraulic lifter cam? The specs look pretty healthy to be so but what do I know, mine isn't close to running (stock)? First sentence highlighted in red above. If it is mechanical lifters, recheck the 2nd sentence highlighted in red above. You can't adjust the valves that way with mechanical lifters.

HTH

Doug
 
#6 ·
Okay, here's what I see:

You had it running and "broken in", I presume when parked, back in 2016. But it appears that you didn't drive it for a year after you brought it home, then had engine trouble driving it home from a shop.

Has this car ever run ON THE ROAD correctly for any length of time?

I get the sense that you had the engine rebuilt, stuck dualies on it, ran it parked for an hour, and drove a short distance home. I say this because it's important for us to know that the jetting/setting of your carbs and the clocking of your dizzy were close enough to spec that we don't have to start asking questions about that kind of stuff. You say that you had to advance the timing until the canister hit the engine. This would cause your backfiring through the carbs you mentioned. If your car ran good for a sustained time at some point, then there would be no reason to mess with it's basic adjustments like valve pre-load. Please tell us if the engine ran good for a sustained time.

Cars that sit can get vacuum leaks. Especially freshly rebuilt engines. New gaskets get compressed over time and leaks can form. Weird, irratic, engine behavior can happen because of vacuum leaks. Stumbling is often caused by fuel starvation or going lean, a vacuum leak can cause a lean condition at individual cylinders. Maybe you have a vac leak at #4 intake, it's now too lean, and it won't fire, even though you have spark and good compression, hence you get a low temp exhaust reading at #4. Maybe the knucklehead who botched up that dash and heater box mod drilled a hole in your exhaust! :lmao:

Could you possibly have a clogged fuel filter.

I'll PM you my number and we can talk about all sorts of possibilities....
 
#7 ·
First of all, thanks for all of the responses.

Here are some answers to the questions asked:

1) The cam and lifters are both hydraulic

2) The car had dual carbs on it prior to the engine rebuild and were adjusted to the previous motor, which obviously had damage which necessitated the rebuild.

3) The car was driven less than 100 miles after the rebuild before being parked to to all the life stuff that came up. During the <100 miles the car ran well, except for the random initial stumble and then the final stumble when leaving that stop sign. Prior to that final stumble, it would fire up easy.

4) Fuel filter, all new fuel lines were ran and new fuel filters installed as well.

5) Vacuum leaks--that's been something I've wondered about, and I need to check.
6) Timing--this is another issue that doesn't make sense, but is on my list to verify. , After the rebuild the car would always fire up after a few pumps of the gas pedal.
7) There was old gas in the tank when we were firing it up and leftover gas sat in the carbs from 2014, so I agree that I need to do a full carb clean out.

I'm thinking the issue(s) will probably be on the simpler side, but I'd rather think of everything ahead of time, just to be thorough.

Life keeps me from being able to devote regular time to work on the car, and since the whole interior is out of the car too, but it's climbing my priority list day by day...

Thanks again for any suggestions or help,

Eric
 
#8 ·
Hang in there Eric, just take it a little at a time and eventually you will get that Opel back on the road.
Not just money and time is needed with our Opel's, but patience. I would definitely start by removing
all the old fuel and thoroughly clean the carb. I would suspect that is the biggest problem.
Good luck, I look forward to hearing your progress.
Dan
 
#9 ·
As already mentioned,
Fresh fuel, clean carbs, verify ignition timing, double check for vacuum leaks and hopefully you ll get her running. Good luck.
 
#10 ·
Prior to disassembling things; first order of business should be a check of the easy things.....visual inspection of the overall engine and components; carbs, mounting studs, ignition wires for quality, coil and wires. Fuel pump and related components up to the carb........Spark plug inspection at electrodes............followed by a simple compression test............followed by a leak-down test of each cylinder


Then and only then do you think about carb disassembly. Or you may wind up with a 20 page thread about getting ticked off and what not.


Sitting anything long term with this alcohol laced fuel is asking for trouble unless some steps are taken prior to taking the car off line. Pre-treatment of the gas tank with a good fuel conditioner such as Sta-bil helps, but even that is good for just a year.

I'm beginning to think the best way to put our cars away is gas pre-treatment with a good fuel stabilizer....followed by running it through the carbs.......followed by shutting the car down and physically draining the carbs of fuel in it's float bowl (a big hassle, that one)

Good luck!

PS: I really, really like your approach here in stating what you did, in a step by step fashion, detailing each step further in what you did.
 
#11 ·
Okay. Now, it sounds to me that the basic fundamentals of your engine set up were sound with maybe just some fine tuning of the carb or timing needed.

So, in my book, Opel engine problems always start with vacuum leaks. Give those manifold-to-block bolts a tweak. 1/8th of a turn can make all the difference in the world.

Purge all that old gas. Every drop of it. Modern gas after 3 months will barely work in our cars. Gas from 2016?????????????? Refill with premium.

Do those two things, try to get yourself back to your original setting, and see how it goes.

:veryhappy
 
#12 ·
Success!

Well, after some reading, asking and thinking, we took another crack at getting the car started.

The research paid off, because the car fired up. Still working on fine tuning the timing and carb adjustments, and until we go through the brakes and a few other items (like having a seat to sit in), I can't give it a road test. However, with the motor running, I have restored energy and have been reinvigorated.

It has a great sound carbs and especially with the cam choice...

Does anyone have a clue on how I can get the video from my iPhone to upload??

Eric
 
#13 ·
Well, after some reading, asking and thinking, we took another crack at getting the car started.

The research paid off, because the car fired up. Still working on fine tuning the timing and carb adjustments, and until we go through the brakes and a few other items (like having a seat to sit in), I can't give it a road test. However, with the motor running, I have restored energy and have been reinvigorated.

It has a great sound carbs and especially with the cam choice...

Does anyone have a clue on how I can get the video from my iPhone to upload??

Eric
Congratulations Eric,
Sounds like you are almost ready to get it on the road (the fun stuff!)
Post your video to You tube, and use the "insert video" button here to post.
Cheers,
RR
 
#15 ·
Sounds nice :yup: and the engine looks great. I really like the chrome valve cover. Have you ever had any issues like peeling or tarnishing. I have heard some have problems when they chrome the valve cover. I'm in the process of rebuilding a 1.9 and want to chrome the valve cover. Just asking any and all for thoughts of chroming, painting or leave original.
 
#149 ·
Dan, you might want to polish the valve cover. I did that on the advice of a chrome guy. He said it would probably peal over a period of time. I had it polished and it looks like chrome, so that's how I did it. I will post a picture of it here tomorrow. I think you will agree that it is better than paint or some of the other options.

Bob
 
#16 ·
Well damn it. I feel like I’m about back to square one again. The car just isn’t running right, in fact #3 doesn’t seem to be firing much at all, the plug is straight black; plus I can pull that spark plug wire off and the engine doesn’t change. Doing that to 2 & 4 damn near kill the engine, 1 just makes it a little slower.

Timing:
I have the initial timing dialed in thanks to the 123Ignition distributor installed, which really helps me on that front. I can literally adjust the advance curve from any and every RPM I want to. If I need to for idle or other RPMs I can.

Spark:
All news plugs and wires from OGTS, along with new cap & rotor from 123 Ignition.

Carbs:
Jetting: I took out ALL of the jets, cleaned them, hit them with some compressed air to make sure nothing was in there. I even rejetted the carb based on calculations from the definitive book on Weber carbs.
I had to take the carb that feeds cylinders 1 & 2 because a main jet fell in the hole. Once that was off I discovered the soft mount between the carb and the intake was damaged (picture attached). That was replaced with a brand new one.

Fuel:
New fuel filters and fuel pump installed, no issues with fuel delivery from tank to carbs.

I’m getting to the point of ripping off the carbs, manifolds and starting over. Part of me wants to get a Weber 38 & a regular intake manifold and go that route. I’m just getting tired of not being able to get this figured out and I’m the road.

I’m all ears on suggestions and advice.

Thanks,

Eric
 
#17 ·
It sure sounds like the #3 isn’t firing. You apparently have gas & spark. How’s the cranking compression?
My apologies if you already posted that I’ve just been skimming through the thread as you post.

If all 3 are good it should be firing, go back to the spark if the ccr is good? I had a similar dilemma recently with the #1 plug being black, I replaced the plug wires and that was the cure. The wires ohm’d out okay but obviously they weren’t okay.
Try replacing the #3 spark plug?
 
#18 ·
Looking back over the whole thread.... I can't see what you did with the old fuel in the tank from long ago. Please tell us all about the old fuel that was in there.

Run a cranking compression test as suggested. It will probably be OK but let's elimnate something like a sticking valve.

What is you initial timing? (Idle timing) How has this timing been verified? What are you using as a timing reference on the engine? Have you verified that you actually have what you think you have for timing with a timing light and marks on the crank pulley? The 123 system sounds great, but if you have not verified that it does what you think it is doing, then you don't know. You cannot assume it does as advertised.
 
#19 ·
Thanks guys. Here are some answers to your questions:

spark:
All new plug wires from OGTS installed today. Plugs were new, as of a week ago. I can change out #3, since I have a new spare set. Maybe I should verify the contact for the rotor on the cap, that’s a variable as well.

compression:
as of October, compression was 185 in each cylinder. I haven’t done a more recent one. Maybe I need to, but I literally haven’t driven the car. It’s just been started and adjusted while in park in my garage. I can’t imagine the compression changed from starting it up and letting it run, but it’s easy to check and rule out.

timing:
I use a digital timing light that allows me to adjust the timing to see what I’m at with a light and mark on the pulley. I have initial timing set at 10 at startup, 13 degrees at 1200rpm. I had to constantly adjust my timing by moving the distributor slightly until I could verify that the timing marks & timing light were what I was after, then compared it to the digital output in the 123 app, until I got them to match. Then I set my advance curve digitally and verified the timing advance at every rpm matched my timing light.

fuel:
tank was emptied out, bone dry in October. Ran until nearly out, new gas went in the tank a month ago. Premium, non-ethanol fuel that I had to drive 20 minutes to get.

Hope that helps color the picture in a little more.

Thank you,

Eric
 
#20 ·
Your car was sitting 5 months since you posted the video. That was more than enough time for ethanol to ruin one or both carburettors. DCOEs appear to be especially vulnerable to ethanol in fuel, may be because their bowl takes significant amount of fuel which stays even if you drain the tank. Your problem is similar to what I experienced two years ago. It was cylinder No. 1 and I killed myself troubleshooting the issue until I realized that it was one of the carburetors. No amount of cleaning and blowing jets of 45 DCOEs could help. Eventually I had to replace it. I have been told that Pierce Manifolds could restore carburetor by removing passage plugs and cleaning ethanol corrosion but it might cost almost as much as new carburetor. Give them a call, they might cut you a deal as you bought carburetors from them. I am since taking care to fill the tank before winter storage with the gas without ethanol and also I add anti-ethanol fuel stabilizer.
 
#21 ·
Thanks for the post PJ. A carb just “went bad”, that’s crazy. I don’t even understand how that happe

I put ethanol free fuel in back in October and again about a month ago. However, the couple of years that the car sat parked it just had regular fuel in it. With that said, before it got parked (right after rebuild and break-in)
several years ago, something happened coming off of a stop sign that caused it to stumble....and that’s what started all this. I never figured that part out and I feel like I’m chasing a ghost.

Pierce Manifolds is in California and seems to be in shut-down mode. I ordered my replacement soft mount from them and had very sparse communication from them via email. No one picked up the store phone or called me back in my attempts over 3 straight days.

I have time to work on this now that I’m stuck at home for the foreseeable future, but I can’t seem to figure it out. Although I’m going to do my best to try to!

Eric
 
#22 ·
Take off the spark plugs wires for all the other cylinders other than 3.

Try and start the car and see if it tries to fire.

If it does it might be a fuel issue. Make sure that rear carburetor isn’t dripping fuel. If it’s not try and shoot some starter fluid into that barrel while the car is running and see if it smooths up. That would show you if it’s clogged. If it is move the fuel enrichment (choke arm) all the way on and see if it runs off that.

The fuel enrichment circuit is essentially its own carb and the GT can idle and drive slowly on it completely. It’s saved my butt a few times. Good for troubleshooting problems.

Also please list out your jetting here although you should be able to idle on almost any reasonable idle jets.
 
#23 · (Edited)
Thanks for the response.

Here are the jets that I started with and what I currently have in the carbs:


Baseline Current carb jetting:

Mains: 140

Air corrector: 185

Emulsion tube: F16

Idle jet: 50f9

Pump jet: 45



Current carb jetting

Mains: 140

Air corrector: 185

Emulsion tube: F2

Idle jet: 60f9

Pump jet: 45

The only other types & sizes of jets I have on hand to try are:
Air corrector: 200
Emulsion tunes: F16 & F11

I’m hoping to get some time to check some things out today. If anyone with DCOE experience ever wants to have a chat about this situation, PM and we can trade numbers.

thanks,

Eric
 
#24 ·
Sounds good on the fuel changeout and timing calibratoin JHJ. Mmmmm 5 months on fuel, even being non-ethanol, can be an issue. You have 2 issues with fuel:
  1. ethanol separation and then combining with water to form gum sounds like that should not be your issue here
  2. oxidation of the fuel, which occurs regardless of whether ethanol is present or not
The fuel oxidation can take place in a matter of months. So don't rule that out. With cold start on those carbs, I would not be surprised for it to be more touchy about fuel quality. I am going to drain out the 4-5 month old non-ethanol fuel in my '75 before I break-in the new engine.

Put the old plug wire back on #3.... wires can be bad out of the box. If you have an ohmmeter, use ti ti check the end to end resistance of the wires. I'd expect them to be in t 3000-5000 ohm range. Then swap out plugs.
 
#26 ·
You aren’t going to like the F2 e-tube, f16 will make you happier with transition.
Your idle jet is going to be way too rich at cruise and probably a bit rich at idle (unless you are running a different size choke tube than my 32mm)
45 pump jets will probably be too small. If you have a flat spot on accel you can go up to a 55 or 50. I run a 70 with no pump exhaust.

Mains are at a good starting point.

Everything should be good enough to idle. I’d bet you need to screw your idle mixture screws in quite a bit for the 60f9 idles.
 
#27 ·
My pet peave is vacuum leaks. They have been the cause of virtually every irratic engine running problem I have had. The key word here is IRRATIC. If your engine runs great one moment and crappy the next, it's NOT your settings, dizzy, jets, timing, and all the other stable adjustment things. I had a soft mount leak on the bottom that I couldn't see or check very easily. The bolt on one runner wasn't tight enough. The car would run great at start up and then start to run bad as it warmed up and air was able to get past the soft mount and into the cylinder. This would change the air/fuel mix on that cylinder and the fuel would not ignite. Hence, black plugs, stumbling, cold exhaust manifold on that/those cylinder(s)(My set up was a single side draft, so one carb barrel ran 2 cylinders). I have found that the bolts that hold the carbs to the manifolds are maddeningly easy to unscrew. I had to get what are called "All-steel lock nuts". Nylon insert lock nuts will not work, they can't handle the heat build up on Opel engines in the manifold area. I even had to double nut them to stop the unscrewing. I also had not luck with the Weber tightening guidelines for those bolts. They say to leave a gap between the loops of the spring washers. Bah! Not tight enough. I found that I needed to tighten the bolts so that you could NOT slide a piece of paper between the carb/manifold and the soft mount. Once I knocked out that booger my side draft system ran flawlessly for 2 years with no attention and every wekend use.
 
#28 ·
Gordo I did the same because I had the same issues. The tightness and vibration tore the soft mount internally and I got a vacuum leak at only high rpm cruise that I couldn’t track down. I refuse to use the soft mount now. I prefer the anti vibration plastic and o ring mounting type.
 
#29 ·
CIH (camshaft in head) engine:
For the Opel CIH (camshaft in head) 4 cylinder engine we modify the 123 Tune according to the dimensions of the original distributor. The long shaft with the drive gear is taken from the old unit. For this it is necessary that you send us an old Opel CIH distributor which fits the engine.


Interesting and expensive distributor.
Are they (123Ignition) able to accomplish refurbishment in the USA or does old Opel distributor core need to be sent to Germany?
 
#30 ·
My pet peave is vacuum leaks. They have been the cause of virtually every irratic engine running problem I have had. The key word here is IRRATIC. If your engine runs great one moment and crappy the next, it's NOT your settings, dizzy, jets, timing, and all the other stable adjustment things. I had a soft mount leak on the bottom that I couldn't see or check very easily. The bolt on one runner wasn't tight enough. The car would run great at start up and then start to run bad as it warmed up and air was able to get past the soft mount and into the cylinder. This would change the air/fuel mix on that cylinder and the fuel would not ignite. Hence, black plugs, stumbling, cold exhaust manifold on that/those cylinder(s)(My set up was a single side draft, so one carb barrel ran 2 cylinders). I have found that the bolts that hold the carbs to the manifolds are maddeningly easy to unscrew. I had to get what are called "All-steel lock nuts". Nylon insert lock nuts will not work, they can't handle the heat build up on Opel engines in the manifold area. I even had to double nut them to stop the unscrewing. I also had not luck with the Weber tightening guidelines for those bolts. They say to leave a gap between the loops of the spring washers. Bah! Not tight enough. I found that I needed to tighten the bolts so that you could NOT slide a piece of paper between the carb/manifold and the soft mount. Once I knocked out that booger my side draft system ran flawlessly for 2 years with no attention and every wekend use.
All Steel lock nuts baby!!
Nothing else holds down the carburetor better!!!
 
#33 ·
A lot of people use this type. The positive is it takes up less than 2mm when compressed so it’s good for GT heater box clearance. Bad news is it will leak after a few years and drive you totally insane.
 
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