Flooding Carbs - Fire Risk and high fuel loss

[Pete Lewis]

who remembers Dab it Off     ???  you got the tric  whiff   Hmmm  

its back but friendly stuff from Kilrock now 

[PeteH]

Story the BIL used to tell, was the Army, (he did National Service) still had C-T fire Extinguishers in the 50`s in their vehicles. They where never full, as the squadies would trickle it out, to use for cleaning oil and stains off the uniforms.

Pete

[johny]

On 24/07/2022 at 00:27, Top Banana said:

All,

I have read all the threads on Carbs flooding and petrol pooring out of the Air fliter box. I had this on my GT6 Mk1 with Stromberg CD 150's, I went 20 miles and lost almost a quarter of the tank. The danger of the situation was; in my mind I thought perhaps I didnt read the fuel gauge correctly when I left the drive way but it had definitely moved a lot but I couldnt piece together the cause ( I am a pilot and you are taught to measure fuel in flight based on time and distance, planes have flow meters - litres/hr like a trip counter to keep you situationally aware at all times).

That day I was driving to meet a friend and show him my new toy. It was only the fact that I stopped and lifted the bonnet to show off and Rev the 6 cyclinder beast; that he immediately noticed a big puddle of fuel on the ground. Panic set in as I saw fuel running out of the Air filter box and rushed to switch off the engine. Roadside repair coming up; so out came the tools and I found the float chamber needle stuck and reluctant to rise and fall, lots of wiggling the jet and wiping a paste like congealed gell on most items, it took a couple of rebuilds to make the car behave enough to drive homel. 

Next day I rebuilt and cleaned that carb again and sealed the gasket on the float chamber. I was too lazy to do the other carb and guess what one day later is also failed and leaked. My carbs were reconditioned/exchange with less than  300 miles, but perhaps its more the 10 years with little use and old fuel that caused the issue.

I now use the fuel pump manual lever to refill my carbs at least once a month when the car is unused (yes I know I should be driving it more often😞) in the hope that this will stop the complete evaporation of fuel in the carb bowls and accompanying gumming up of their float and needle valves.... 

[Pete Lewis]

thats a good call 

Pete