You'll have a vivid awareness should you be holding into said wire too...burnt flesh stinks.
Yeah. You wanna see something like that?
Next time you meet me, look at my left thumb or index finger.
Pretty impressive scars, for sure.
OK, so it’s an RF burn, but it looks the same. UGLY!
Drove the car to the office today. Sure is great to drive it again. Pulled the carbs apart to check for crud in the jets. All ship shape. Pulled the tops off. All clean.
Can't figure out whats causing this crappy miss under hard acceleration / under power.
I will check the floats: 
So each of these photos above has the float arm just touching the spring loaded BB. One is 20mm at the edge of the furthest float. The other is 22.
FULL droop is 28 on one 30mm on the other, plus the gasket
9mm inside / 11mm outer side (closest to my thumb)
9.5 / 9.5
This is all voodoo to me. Thoughs?
Ted
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How’s the timing curve look as your engine revs up? Are you getting proper spark advance?
I will check that tomorrow. Good call.
Ted
@Stan Galat / others
Any suggestions on the floats? I'm at a loss. I read the stuff in the KB. Not sure I' too far out of spec and may error on the side of not messing with them at all and just reassembling the carbs. What do you guys think?
Ted
Here is my suggestion:
french vanilla I cream a dibble of Carmel and some hard root beer (6% abv)
tasty and a buzz in one awesome FLOAT!
Was that the question?
Tebs
I'm wondering if I need to mess with my carb floats. Car is running like pooh. High RPM miss in first. If I hammer the throttle in first the rpms start breaking apart like crazy above 4200. Same thing with a long pull in third. 4300 the car starts to stumble and sputter. Its a crap show.
Need a weber mechanic local.
Havent ruled out the ignition module from when I wired the cooling fan to the negative side of the coil.
Pertronix module? You know how I feel about that. What you are describing sounds exactly like a bad module. You can prove it by throwing a timing light on and watching the spark scatter all over.
I’m not wild about the floats being a different height side to side inside the same carburetor, but I think your miss is ignition. Those floats have been exactly like they are for a long time- they were like that when the car was running well. Nobody got inside and bent them while you were sleeping.
95% of all carburetion problems are ignition.
Totally agree.
It's the Magnaspark II distributor. If that's a Pentronix module then you can put me in the same camp as you. I think this was my fault though. 
I ordered a new one. $70.00 plus shipping. I slap the carbs back together tonight.
I will say that I drove the car all over yesterday and it was joy. The 5 speed was nice but it wasn't life changing. (eeek!)
TRP posted:...The 5 speed was nice but it wasn't life changing...
Wait until @Terry Nuckels is chasing you down a twisty mountain road.
Sounds like the start of a bad dream... 
Drive the car!!!!!!!! be honest with us. shifting thru the gears with that five speed has to be better than that four speed. If it isn't, maybe it's time to buy a boxster.
Give it time
But if you were looking for a drop in rpm cruising with an aircooled you dont get ghat with a five speed
IaM-Ray posted:Give it time
But if you were looking for a drop in rpm cruising with an aircooled you dont get ghat with a five speed
It's all about how you build the five speed to achieve your goal. yes with tire size, motor size/cam/head combo and the right fifth gear you can dropping the rpm at cruising speed. type of shroud and fan speed are also a factor.
Anthony posted:Drive the car!!!!!!!! be honest with us. shifting thru the gears with that five speed has to be better than that four speed. If it isn't, maybe it's time to buy a boxster.
Hahaha! Let me gwt through this spell with the ignition and then I will be able to focus.
I will say going from 5th to 4th is great. No more pegging the RPMs with each down shift.
Ironically, the close-ratio five-speed makes more of a difference the slower you drive.
If you normally blast around all day at 4-5000 rpm, and make most shifts near the redline, you may not need a five-speed. Yeah, you'll get off the line and through the quarter faster with that extra cog, but if that's all you care about, you can probably just juggle the ratios in your four-speed box and accomplish almost the same thing.
It's the rest of the time - when you're just noodling around in the neighborhood, or carving through some twisties, or cruising a fast two-lane with some steep hills, that you start to really appreciate the five-speed.
I think my engine is just about in the middle of the heap as our cars go. A mildly-tuned two-liter set up to have some low-end torque, but to keep its cool here in the land of Dry Heat. It's strong, but not a screamer. It's happiest around 3000 rpm. By 3500, it's starting to work. By 4000, it's tapping me on the shoulder and saying, "Hey, how long are we going to keep this up? I take it to 5000 when I really need to scoot - like merging onto a freeway. It's a blast and comes on strong there, but that's not where I or the motor want to spend most of our time.
Ted rang one of the five-speed bells - that 5-4 downshift is one of the main attractions. You're on the highway, around 55-60, and you come to a hill that's a little too steep for top gear. With my four-speed, I dreaded that downshift to third. Bang, there we were at 4500, and I had a buzz saw in my ear. Now, it's 3800 or 4000, and no big deal. A two-liter will pull up almost any hill in that gear at pretty low speeds with no complaints.
That gear is also my cruising gear of choice on a lot of the foothill roads around here. These were graded for horse-drawn wagons in the Gold Rush - tight turns, and short, steep grades. You're cruising at 35-60 and need short bursts of torque to power through. A freeway gear is just too tall here, but third is too short.
Bottom line is that the car is just a lot quieter when you want it to be with the five-speed. You've got more options. Tear it up or just cruise. You never worry about having the right gear in a Civic or a Corolla. This brings the same kind of ease to a Speedster, even if you don't have a monster in the engine bay.
Three - four through the twisty stuff.
You either get it or you don't.
Stan Galat posted:Pertronix module? You know how I feel about that. What you are describing sounds exactly like a bad module. You can prove it by throwing a timing light on and watching the spark scatter all over.
I’m not wild about the floats being a different height side to side inside the same carburetor, but I think your miss is ignition. Those floats have been exactly like they are for a long time- they were like that when the car was running well. Nobody got inside and bent them while you were sleeping.
95% of all carburetion problems are ignition.
Listen to Uncle Stan. We all know the Pertronix (piece of sh*t) modules are made to a price point and are not up to the heat of a VW engine compartment (was it Gordon who said they weren't made of sufficiently hardened components for the intended use? Typically built for the cheap assed VW aircooled market!).
And yeah, the extra gear isn't life changing- that's what getting married, having kids, committing to buying a house and changing careers (you know- growing up and becoming (ughh; I hate this word!) responsible!) is for. Listen to Mitch, though, and go chase Terry down through a nice canyon drive. I'll bet when you tell us about it you'll be pretty excited when it gets to the part where you were able to keep up with him and sliced and diced those guys who thought they'd blow you away and make you both look like fools.
That's what 5th (and a 2 liter) is all about...
"That's what 5th (and a 2 liter) is all about..."
It's even better with 5th and a 3.6 liter...
Bob: IM S6 posted:"That's what 5th (and a 2 liter) is all about..."
It's even better with 5th and a 3.6 liter...
You could have a two-speed powerglide with that engine, Bob.
We need several newbies to buy cars. The State is burning to the ground.
If the Pentronix is a pile, what's the right distributor and ignition to put in there?
To be fair - I've only had the pleasure of driving the car on the freeway (mostly) since I've been trying to sort out this ignition issue. Maybe I need to find some curves and have some fun. There is the other issue that I haven't driven the car for a while. I've only put 2800 miles on it since I bought Tom's motor! it's possible I forget what the 4 speed was like.
I've noticed the 5 speed is significantly louder in 3rd and 4th. I'm assuming that's normal.
Regardless of all that, I'm super excited to have the car running and drive-able again.
Ted, when we discussed the five speed a while back I mentioned that the third and fourth will be louder than the stock gears due to the gear tooth cut. [aftermarket gears]. Also the front berg mount with the alum spacers transmit more noise.
the pertronix is a hit and miss. some customers have no issues and others been thru a couple of modules. remember you can't leave the key in on position while engine is not running because it will burn the unit up. Mitch has had good luck with the CB unit and we have installed a few MSD units with great success.
Anthony!
Im sure you mentioned the gears being louder. That conversation was two and a half years ago! Im sure it slipped my mind. I run the Magnaspark 2 from CB. I bet I smoked it when I wired the 12v+ draw to the - on the coil. I'll own that. 
What the heck have you guys been up to!? I haven't replied here in over a year?!
Here is what has been keeping me busy:
Started out as a good runner. Poor paint. Okay interior. I went nuts and completely redid the entire car top to bottom.
Here is the punch line... Tinkering with the notion of a ... 5 speed!
Now that this one is done I can shift my attention back to the Speedster.
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Ted,
Nice car. Boy your son has grown !!! I guess the Austin, will be his driver education vehicle.
Art
He really was mini
Actually my son and I did the Pacific coastal highway in April of 2015 when he got home he tells me you know dad I could not see over the dash at times...
I said to him why didn't you say something then we could have gotten you a cushion.
Today he is nearly 6'2" and has no issues.
Wicked cool, Ted.
850cc, 1,000 or 1275?
He's grown so much in the past year, it's crazy. The pants he's wearing in the photo above are now about 3" too short for him!
I'm looking forward to getting back on the speedster.
Gordon Nichols posted:Wicked cool, Ted.
850cc, 1,000 or 1275?
1310. HIF44 SU. Mainflow Long center branch header, single can silencer. 3.44 diff. S discs. Big valve head. 1.4:1 Carver rockers.
I went bonkers with it.
Okaayyyy! I have had an issue with the Speedster since putting in the motor/5 speed. The car would just die when driving it. After about 20 minutes or so it would buck a little bit and die. After a bit... It would just start again without any issue.
When I installed the motor I "upgraded" to an AN6 stainless steel fuel line setup. It buttoned up the engine nicely.
The last time the car died and wouldn't restart I noticed the fuel pressure gauge was buried on 0 with the fuel pump running. When the car started back up... I noticed the fuel pressure was right at 1.5psi. Made me wonder if the fuel was vapor locking.
Pulled the stainless lines and swapped out with low tech rubber fuel line. Drove it for an hour. Let it idle for 20 minuted while I futzed with carb adjustment... No stalling.
Now I have two odd carburator issues. Im running 44IDFs
1) The fuel mixture screw for the number 1 cylinder has zero impact on the way the car idles.
2) When trying to balance the carbs, the number 3 cylinder has more draw than the other 3 are all at 3" that other one is 4".
Need to do some internet searches / you tube research. Once I button that up... I will be placing the car up for sale.
I never thought I would type those words.
First of all, 3 psi for Webers, not 1.5, that's for Solex/Kadrons.
The cylinder with no effect on screw most probably has a plugged idle circuit.
The snail gauge readings at idle can be addressed by my article on carb sync, available here for paying members and on Spyderclub.com for everyone else in Tips and Tricks section.
Do you have any tight bends in the AN lines? Rubber works with tighter bends that stainless AN lines.
No tight bends. Just big beautiful sweeping curves.
https://www.airkewld.com/IDF-W...-Line-Kit-p/8083.htm
May be too early to tell for sure. I need to fix the uneven draw on the left bank and then figure out why the #1 mixture screw isn't working.
That hard fuel line kit should be ILLEGAL to sell. Yeah, lets put hard lines on an engine that grows maybe 1/4" and then shrinks when it cools. Can you say metal fatigue? Eventually, those lines are going to crack. When that happens, I don't want to be around.
That kit could be fixed with a 2" long flexible hose between the carbs.
I just worked on an engine that has that setup and told hi, to get rid of it or modify it.
@TRP bring the carb with both barrels reading 3 up a touch with the idle speed screw on that carb. On the carb that reads 3 and 4, bring the low barrel up with the idle air bypass. Then re-balance and make it happy at idle with all 4 throats the same at whatever idle speed you prefer. Don't shoot for any particular reading, just all 4 the same. Then do a high speed sync.
I tried to adjust the idle air bypass on #4 to bring it up to match #3 and it didn't make ANY difference. Super odd. I took a break for the rest of the day.
1- What Danny said about the hard fuel line kit. There has to be some flexible line to account for expansion during warm up or it's a disaster waiting to happen. It won't happen for a while, but when (not if) it does...
2- Again, as Danny said, 3psi for fuel pressure and start with all the rest he said as well.
Sorry to hear you're selling the Speedster, Ted, but after your experience with the Berg 5 I'm not surprised. Good luck with putting a 5th gear in the Mini, and if you're ever through Vancouver, look me up- you still owe me a couple beers
Well... After nearly 8 years of ownership this thread will draw to a close. This past weekend I sold the speedster to a new owner. The car now resides in Turlock California. I'll let the new owner introduce himself when he is ready.
Selling the Speedster was step two of a three part plan to simplify the garage (step one was selling the mini at auction back in November). The final step will be listing and selling the Boxster.
It seems fitting that selling the Speedster brought with it some rain to our golden state. Or maybe the rain came from me buying another plastic car?
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Sorry to see it go, Ted. From the 2 liter, wide 5 discs (what kit did you go with again?) to the Berg 5 and Tecnomagnesio wheels (the only thing lighter than the Vintage 190's), you built a pretty neat car. Sorry to see it go. At least you had the sense to buy another convertible (what year is it?) and I hope you still hang out here occasionally. Al
Yeah, sort of sad to see it go. Fun ride for sure.
The new car is a 1966. CA car it's entire life. Central Valley car up until 83 (two owners; one in Fresno and one in Lodi). From 83 until 2020 it was owned by the same guy in Alameda. It's in fantastic shape. 327/300. 4 speed. Very well documented maintenance record and ownership history. Oddly enough this was a factory soft top delete car.
I'll hang around here for sure. Someone needs to pick on Teby. Plus I'll be heading to Fresno to bug Robert when I have the soft top installed on the car. As luck would gave it, Fresno is home to THE best (only?) C1/C2 soft top frame builders in the US.
Anybody wanna buy a 2000 Boxster S, 43k miles, soft top and hard top.
Ted
.
Sad Ted, but I guess life must go on.
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, plastic to plastic.
.
...Rust to rust.
Let me know when you show up in Fresno Ted. I think I owe you a beer or two!
had a 66 396/425, no PS or PB, was a handful to drive at low speeds, blue with white soft top, no hardtop
Great looking car! I want an early C3 chrome bumper, but haven't completely convinced my wife...yet.
But, I have a question...does your neighbor get high-centered driving into their garage??
Ted!
You gonna put a 5-speed into the 'Vette?
Just kidding, but there was a guy in one of my car clubs that had a Doug Nash 4+3 overdrive in his Vette. It was a later model car, though.
That '66 is a very pretty car, for sure and they never, ever look old.
Not sad Ted! It's much fun to see a new owner having a great time. I love when @Ryan (formerly) in NorCal post photos in the car he got from me. Plus I'm sure you will stick around these parts. I owe you post COVID beers, I think you bought last time.
-=theron