My 251 dual carb set-up


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Posted by Paul Cook on Tuesday, July 05, 2005 at 10:06AM :

In Reply to: WANTED: 251 dual carb set-up posted by mclark on Monday, July 04, 2005 at 9:10PM :

In 1958, my parents chipped in to help me buy a neighbor's 1950 Plymouth Special Deluxe four-door sedan. This was my "sensible" car to have at college.

At a time when the V-8 in a two door coupe or hard top was the desirable ride, I had a typical school teacher's ho-hum-mobile.

I immediately started to do some performance upgrades. I found a stock exhaust manifold that had been converted for duals by sealing of the heat riser, welding in a plate there to split it, and cutting a hole and welding in a second exhaust outlet. Because the car was so new (8 years) I had no trouble separating the exhaust and intake to switch the exhaust manifold.

Next came a Mallory dual-breaker-point distributor conversion and a high output Mallory coil. A year before we bought the car, the neighbor had the head milled to resolve a leaking head gasket. It wasn't much, but I did have a milled head.

Then, I found a dual carburetor manifold. It was set up for a pair of Stromberg 97 carbs. The 97 was a top carb in the fifties and I was able to buy a pair that were matched for dual installations. The Plymouth accelerator linkage was on top of the engine and had a bell crank that moved the carb lever crossways. (The standard carb was mounted 90 degrees from where most carbs would have been mounted.) There’s a pivoting rod on the POWER WAGON firewall across the back of the engine that keeps the pedal movement at the carb going fore and aft. I found all the pieces to convert the throttle linkage to fore and aft movement to operate the dual carb setup.

I had all the parts, gaskets, and tools in the car. I had taken off the inner fender well to facilitate the switch. As was my custom, I spent each summer week end at a lake 50 miles from home. I planned to install the carb setup between sessions of waterskiing and girl chasing.

All was going well. The old stuff came off easily. Then, when I tried to slide the new intake manifold on, I discovered it was too long for my 218 block. I was not very happy as a put all the old stuff back on.

I finally sold the long manifold and carb set up to a guy who had a Chrysler Windsor with the big six. I didn’t lose any money, but there is still a little joy missing from my life even after 47 years have passed.

If I still had that set up, I wouldn’t sell it. I would just go out to the parts room every so often and hug it. It was just another young man’s busted dream.




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