Carter BBD

Econoline

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Recently 63falcon4drwagon wrote:

"I just installed a China made $72.00 Carter BBD lowtop 285 cfm two barrel on my large log 1978 200 head.
Both the cable throttle and cable C4 kickdown cable are connected to the gas pedal under the dash.
I welded an arm on to the carb choke linkage to use my stock 1963 choke cable.
The Carter BBD has 1 1/4" throttle bores which are closely spaced making it an easier conversion than a Holley or Autolite.
The adapter I was made from 1" x4" x 6" aluminum.
The carb has to be turned at an angle which turned out great for my 1978 Fairmont cable throttle linkage modifications
I had to raise the carb higher to clear the valve cover so I made an 1/2" red oak carb spacer out of two pieces of 1/4" oak fiberglassed together.
These Chinese carbs don't come with an air cleaner hold down bracket. I had to make one.
I have the stock 1963 Falcon air cleaner modified to fit this carb.
The 1" aluminum is easy to drill and to cut with a router bit.
After drilling 3 pilot holes my tiny drill press would not cut a 1 3/4" hole saw so I used a heavy duty 1/2" hand drill.
The intake and adapter is hogged out so this adapter is not some silly funnel setup.

It seems to be all the carb or more than this stock engine needs. I was building the adapter for another engine I'm rebuilding but decided to try it on the engine already in my Falcon. I enlarged the intake after stuffing rags and grease in the log. I think the Sniper would work at an angle. The angled stud holes on the intake need to go between the outer carb mount holes when making a one piece adapter. This puts the carb at an angle. My cable throttle would not have been long enough if not angled.
273 ~ {1964 thru 1969} Carter BBD {1.437" Throttle Plates x 1.063" Venturi}.......... 275 CFM Rating
318 ~ {1968 and up} Carter BBD {1.437" Throttle Plates x 1.186 Venturi}............ 285 CFM Rating
383 ~ {1962 thru 1971} Carter BBD {1.563" Throttle Plates x 1.313" Venturi}.......... 365 CFM Rating"

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I got that image to print at scale by enlarging it 116% in my printer dialog.

The maximum BBD bore opening is around 1 9/16" x 3" vs 1 11/16" x 3 9/16" for the 2300 and a pad size of 4" vs 5 1/8". It can flow more than most of us will ever need. Holley claims their Sniper version can support up to 350HP.

63falcon4drwagon mounted one directly to his head by shifting it inline with the bolt holes for the bore to fit in between them on the stock carb pad. I'd love to see some pictures of that set up showing the linkage and clearance to the valve cover. I'm fascinated by this carb b/c of it's footprint mostly but it has an interesting history and the fact that holley released the sniper bbd puts it right into the wheelhouse of what I want to do for my van.

Looking at the stock lrg log head this carb will mount onto the length of the stock carb pad along the log. I'm thinking mill it flat, bore it out and make a simple adapter to bolt it to the log with studs for the carb and never hardly get outside of the length of the stock mount on the log. It looks like it aligns best with the log if the outer edge of the bore aligns to the outer edge of the 1 3/4" bore on the log. Iow, aligning the bbd's inboard pad side to the long flat inboard edge of the stock carb pad. And that keeps it as far away from the valve cover as practical. The question is how high it needs to be to clear the valve cover and which orientation best suits it and the fuel lines and linkage.





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this is different than the 'phase 2' I thought U were goin with? (efi)
 
Unfortunately that won't work for me. I have to keep the top at or below 6" from the top of the log to fit inside of the doghouse. That's 6" from the surface of the actual log near the carb mount pad, not the carb mount. 1 1/2" from the carb mount would put me more than 5/8" too high.

My idea to lower the carb after looking at it this morning is to mill the pad off. Mount it as shown in my pic but use a 1" piece of aluminum and cut the throttle bore @ 22.5* through the adapter giving me a 3/8" offset and a clearance of 1 5/8" from the edge of the bbd gasket to the valve cover. This would keep the carb at or below where my YFA is now, which is as high as will fit.

Chad, this is phase 2. I was looking into fitech and holley sniper efi's and I like the features of the sniper better. Holley has more robust software to better tune by giving you a PC program to do more advanced tuning. I'm liking this path better than my original plan to go with GM tbi and I think it will be cheaper to do easily. If I can adapt a BBD carb to my engine I can put a Sniper BBD on there :eek:
 
63falcon4drwagon":be44yk15 said:
I would not mill the log!
This log carb opening area is larger area of both throttle bores of a BBD.
The BBD venturi is smaller than the bore size. Make it simple.

I was vaguely aware of the BBD carb at one time but had pretty much forgotten about it. It is a good low cost 2v carb for most Ford six owners it seems. These pics show how to do it and this is the kind of value engineering that appeals to me. Might work on my Bronco.
 
:unsure: what about turning the carb 180 degrees? This would also give a better flow through the throdle blades i.e. A more direct shot. :nod: (y)
 
180* around won't work. There's too much carb on that side. It's got to be mounted with the linkage on the fwd side. 90* on a 2v or aluminum head. Seems like having it skewed in between the studs may be good wide distribution though w/the log. I don't know.
 
63falcon4drwagon":14jg0jzz said:
Econoline":14jg0jzz said:
Unfortunately that won't work for me. I have to keep the top at or below 6" from the top of the log to fit inside of the doghouse. That's 6" from the surface of the actual log near the carb mount pad, not the carb mount. 1 1/2" from the carb mount would put me more than 5/8" too high.
If you can get the throttle body turned straight the valve cover clearance should increase. I may have been able to go with just the one inch spacer if I banged in or modified the valve cover for long idle speed and choke fast idle speed screw clearance. This is what I did on a bench mock up. I didn't want to bang in or modify my 1965 valve cover. I did dimple it in two spots and shorten the screws.
The Sniper throttle body does not have the long idle speed or choke fast idle speed screws that hit the valve cover.

That's good to hear. From what I could tell I needed 1" to the valve cover to clear the vacuum stubs and another 1/2" to get a hose on.

Thank you for the pictures. I love it. Weren't you talking about the relationship between cfm and diameter recently? Like we could enlarge it a 1/4" easy and it would flow x much better and leave at least 3/16" for the gasket, go as far as we can.. Was that you?
 
I've been thinking about this and looking at what you've done. I'm considering buying one of these carbs or finding a junk carb and looking at the clearance issues with my cracked head. And look at opening it up like you did on the stock carb pad and see if I can orient it to clear everything with lower spacing. It looks like I can use the stock fwd carb stud for the bbd and have room to install a machine screw in the other hole to secure the adapter and still have just enough space to have a stud in the adapter for the bolt very near that hole. It would offset the carb aft slightly. If so, then funnel/transition the carb bore into the opened up newly odd shaped bore of the stock carb pad with a 3/4 - 1" adapter. If it works I'll figure out the linkage and do like you did and not mill the head and do it in place. As far as the Sniper flow goes, there are no venturi's being efi, and the throttle bore's are 1 3/8" from what I can tell. I will ask them about the flow before purchase. Right now I'd just like to get a 2v on there and be ready for the swap when I can afford it and have time to do the fuel system mods.
 
Good luck another piece of chinese junk. Where would you get parts for this thing??
Do it right and install a Holley 350 on there.
Parts are no problem & an automatic choke is available.
The Autolite is also an excellent choice.
Again parts are readily available.
Another plus is the help from our members of this forum on both of those carbs.
 
Where's the fun in that Bill? ;) Next thing you know I'll be putting a sbc crate engine in lol.

Kidding aside I know what you're saying. For me half the fun is macgyvering these things and another 75-100 cfms is good step up in flow over the YFA for $70 and little work. I'm sure it's hit and miss but a year and a half later my $70 Chinese YFA clone is still running like champ. If I figure 75-80% ve, 255 cu inches, and a 5000 rpm redline I'm around 300-325 cfm's, I never spin it up to 5000 though. I'll bet the TBI version flows at least 400. Btw, the throttle bore on these is 1 7/16"
 
Econoline":ettfy44o said:
Where's the fun in that Bill? ;) Next thing you know I'll be putting a sbc crate engine in lol.

Kidding aside I know what you're saying. For me half the fun is macgyvering these things and another 75-100 cfms is good step up in flow over the YFA for $70 and little work. I'm sure it's hit and miss but a year and a half later my $70 Chinese YFA clone is still running like champ. If I figure 75-80% ve, 255 cu inches, and a 5000 rpm redline I'm around 300-325 cfm's, I never spin it up to 5000 though. I'll bet the TBI version flows at least 400. Btw, the throttle bore on these is 1 7/16"
Thats true. I would like to see an A/F test done with a wide-band.
I wonder what jets it comes with???
 
I saw a couple of Carter BBD on Ebay that were sold as cores. One was priced low that I recall maybe around $30? Could probably get parts for that but hard to know exactly what you are getting buying used carbs.
 
I was thinking of going out to the local yard and seeing if they had one laying around for cheap or an old jeep or whatever. Yeah the jetting could be a big problem, I doubt they are available and if you're buying a carb for a 318 that flows ~280 cfms it might run rich. On the other hand if the Chinese carbs sold for the 258's have the larger 318 venturi's but are jetted down it could be workable. You can always make them bigger. Actually I've soldered jet's and redrilled them to. It's less than ideal. But with a little care and a good numbered drill set it's doable.

Ultimately I like the idea of a 285 cfm carb that can be adapted to mount on the stock carb mount and I'm going to tbi so all the jetting stuff and the venturi cfm rating is going to be in the rear view mirror eventually.

When I re-did my exhaust last summer I welded a bung in for an O2 sensor. If I mount one of these carbs I'll hook it up with a sensor and a gauge.
 
seekin the highest 1v tq monster available.
Will B tryin the RBS (just cuz I got it & is v e r y low to clear hood) in a mo or so...

Isnt the BBD a 2V?

Monojet looks good but too hi & won't mount my "M" 250 head, eh? 3, 400 bucks?
I like'n C the ele choke, the cmf, tho.
 
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