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Carb restoration

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The 2 guys I hear the most about are Joe Cuerto (sp?) and Hap Waldrop (https://www.acmespeedshop.com). Hap's rebuilding the carbs for my 1275 right now. I'm sure there are others who do good work as well.
 
I agree with Drew. Joe is the SU master. We've got a set of Hap's carbs for the HProd Midget and wouldn't hesitate to go back to him in the future either.
 
I just had mine done by the guy on Ebay. His is a true craftsman and believe me it's worth twice the money!
I wish I had 1/2 the cash I wasted trying to get them rebuilt myself.

His name is Chester Gillings and he has a great web site with information and tech support.

www.sucarbs.com
 
A friend of mine had his Z cars carbs rebuilt by Paltech in Ohio. I was very impressed and had mine done there as well. I couldn't have been happier, prices are reasonable and turn around was extremely quick. Here is the link.
https://www.paltech1.com/
 
Do you know Hap has an eight month back log on engine work. Business is great up that way.
 
I have rebuilt two sets of carbs my self. All of the replacement items come from Joe Curto regardless where they are purchased. There are two schools of thought:
1) If you want carbs that run to OEM specs and will work well, you can do them your self in about 3 hours.
2) If you want pretty polish and plated hardware I would suggest sending them out.
Pretty polished chambers and plated linkage will not affect how they operate. But they do look nice!
 
jlaird said:
Do you know Hap has an eight month back log on engine work. Business is great up that way.
Click to expand...

Not on carbs, I do have a back log on carbs right now, but more like 6 weeks or so, i use the smaller jobs, like carb rebuilding as I'm waiting on machine work for the engines, any jobs, like head porting/ rebuilding, carb rebuilding, crank work, etc. can be worked in much faster than the engine line, currently the engine line is 5-6 engines deep, so more like Spring 2009 start time for a complete engine right now. The engine line is about half race and half street engines.

Ray's 1275 engine is my current engine project, the block is boreed, caustic washed, most all the parts are here, crank goes off for grinding next week, head for pressure checking, while i have plenty of prep work to do on rays engine, I probably end up waiting on the crnak, so I go to a carb rebuilding job. So there, that gives you guys a general run down of how jobs get done, but the point is the small jobs get worked in fastrer than engines.

I know much about Chester's SU work, his carbs look nice, personally I think he is giving away his labor, we'vew talked about it, guys that do that don't survive, so it might be worth taking up Chester on a rebuild right now. I know he's somewhat new to SU rebuilding. There a few guys out there doing cheaper work, than Joe Curto, or Jimmy Hilton or myself, and we all feel you have the right to shop, we just don't want to work for french frying hourly rates, I think most of you uderstand and value quality work, we all got make a living. I made my mind up a long time ago, I didn't want to strive to be the cheapest, just the best.
 
Joe -

Maybe this is heresy -- ever consider the Weber setup. I did as most others have - rebuild and after a year or two; buy a new setup. I've heard wonderful things regarding Hap & Joe Curto. I felt parts would be easier to obtain going forward and my friends knew the Weber (SU help in my area was worse that tryign to borrow money). Secondly; I can get the setup in under a week (ALL NEW).

I've had the Weber setup all summer and think it's the best upgrade I've done - and I've done most of them.

Good Luck-

Geor
 
jmwuva05 said:
A friend of mine had his Z cars carbs rebuilt by Paltech in Ohio. I was very impressed and had mine done there as well. I couldn't have been happier, prices are reasonable and turn around was extremely quick. Here is the link.
https://www.paltech1.com/
Click to expand...

Not picking sides, but I can also vouch for Jeff at Paltech. He does great work. My HIF6 as it looked out of the box:

642096537208_0_ALB.jpg

152096537208_0_ALB-1.jpg
 
Jeff at Paltech did my carbs as well. Very pleased; although Hap and Joe Curto have outstanding reputations as well. You can't go wrong with any of them.
 
Thanks for the advise guys I guess I have some thinking to do. I really wasn't budgeting for carbs this year but I was having a fit trying to get them to run properly. This past weekend I made some progress and was able to determine much of the issues that I was experiencing was a result of a stuck float. I took the whole setup off, cleaned again and double checked my settings. After the adjustments the car is running MUCH better. I think i'll hold off on ordering parts or rebuilding for now but if I do decide to go that route i'll certainly keep this thread in mind.
 
These are Haps carbs. When I got them back and installed them on the engine, I knew I would have to tune them a little. <span style="font-weight: bold">Not So! </span> Their as Hap set them and the engine performs flawlessly! AND, Along with Jeffs rebuilt 25-D distributor,(With Points), I get 30 MPG! Needless to say, I'm very happy with the whole setup!
bananasmile.gif


72eng3.jpg
 
Now just how in the world does Hap adjust the carbs without the engine? I just can not see how that is possible.
 
I think he meant that the initial jet heights let the car start and run OK. But they could probably use a slight bit of adjustment. However, if the plugs look good... don't touch the adjustments.
 
jlaird said:
Now just how in the world does Hap adjust the carbs without the engine? I just can not see how that is possible.
Click to expand...

It's possible cause I had my guy do the same thing. I had rebuilt it - car wasn't starting, took in the carb. He set it up according to whatever specs he had and it ran perfectly.

Was watching Top Gear last week and they were talking about a car the comment was, "leave it the way the factory set it, every time you fiddle with it, it gets worse." I suspect carbs can be like that
 
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