Tell Me Why the Price Range is so wide on these 2 Identical carbs.

[BradMph]

OK, I was exploring some duel carbs and came across an Ad for some 44IDF side draft air horn carbs. In fact, 2 Ads.
One carb is selling for about $134.00 shipped. The Other is a Genuine Weber selling for $469.00 shipped. The cheaper carb has the exact same parts as the weber. The Ad specifies this boldly.
As well, the weber carb is described as being a race carb and cold starting would be a little tough to maintain because of this feature. Apparently the choke on the weber isn't working as well as a 34/32 like we all have.

So, why is this price so low in compared to the high priced weber if the low priced carb has the exact same parts???

What could be expected if one was to buy a set of low priced carbs to play with. I am sure if one was to buy them, they damn sure better go through them and possibly do some flash removal and left over metal shavings from production, but hell...$335.00 less is low enough to do a micro-blueprint on the darn thing and still have a premium set of carb.

How is this possible? Is weber dry pumping customer's poop shoots for their carbs? Sure looks like it might be if the same parts are used in both.
Looks at these carbs, I see almost identical casting and parts on both. Even if the cheapy carb needed some replacement parts, you could buy from weber I imagine. Looks like someone has been stealing weber castings and rebranding them with lower quality casting material?

anyone have factual experience about this price variance?

carb.jpg

By the way, the weber is on the right.

[pennyman1]

I would think they are like the knock off webers that we hammer on all the time - no way they could be any good for that much of a price difference.

[RCY1989]

I would agree. Has to be brand. Is the cheaper brand been around awhile? I have always heard weber. It's also what I installed on my truck. Nothing like what your looking at but I would rather go quality.

[camoit]

I would go with a set off a motorcycle and just build a manifold for it. Zoom. 4 carbs is better then 1 or 2

[geezer101]

The parts might be 'identical' but what about the quality of the castings internally? If they're junk there will be no amount of tweaking anyone could do to salvage it (which would explain the $300+ price difference). And +1 to camo's comment. Used bike carbs can be had for cheaps and if you're prepared to put the time into designing/modding a manifold for them and tuning them you will see an awesome all round improvement in power, torque and fuel economy - plus they are hell sexy to see hanging off the side of an engine and the induction noise is to die for!

[BradMph]

I'm with Camoit on the carbs mod and agree that would be the way, if you could not get a decent weber price with a choke carb. I am getting more interested in a duel side draft after seeing one on a friends truck the other day. The guy is from Guam and his setup looks awesome. It sounds almost V8ish, but with a hush muffler. The acceleration he had was also very impressive. He kept up pretty good with my MR2. One thing I didn't like with his setup, he had no air filters in the horns which could be catastrophic if something sucked into one.
I am going to start gathering prices on parts for a transition. If it isn't too bad, I will probably start a build on them. I do want some type of a choke system for the weather up here, this is a must. I also have an intake manifold that I can cut for mounting. It pretty much would have to wait until a carb set was found before hand.
I'll probably be asking questions later on this something like this. Checking around on what others use.

One last thought, might maybe a 4 bl carb work possibly? like a Holley or Edelbrock, or would this config be robbing power that a motorcylce setup would give?

Here is the link for those cheaper carbs.
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from...+carb&_sacat=0

Looking at these carbs, I think webers price was for duels if I am not mistaken. But still it had no choke system.

[pennyman1]

one of the issues with the IDF carbs are they are downdrafts, not sidedrafts. DCOE webers are what you want - 40's for a 2l, 45's for a 2.6, with a cam ground for the increase in fuel. As far as motorcycle carbs, hayabusa throttle bodies are cheap, and have fuel injection and throttle position sensors for hookup to a megasquirt ECM.

[geezer101]

IMO DCOE's are severely overrated. A pair of them cost a bomb, if you look sideways at them they go out of tune, are absurdly hard on fuel economy and are hopeless on a road car. O.k. if you drive with your foot buried in the floor pan, but a set of 39mm bike carbs will flow the same as a pair of DCOE's and will run rings around them in performance and fuel efficiency. I REALLY want to R&D bike carbs and a custom manifold one day

[pennyman1]

tell us how you really feel about DCOEs Geezer... yes all those things are true, but they still look cool...

[geezer101]

...you really want me to tell you what I think? Yeah, the bike carbs take a bit of assing around - but I am an assing kind of guy and would rather invest my time into something that won't bankrupt me every time I drive it and punch like a train from the get go. I'm beginning to think using a 3D printer would be a feasible way to design a prototype manifold and then take reliefs from it to cast an actual alloy unit from it. The biggest hurdle in using bike carbs is manifold design and construction and 3D printing is a lot more affordable than conventional methods. One day...

[ILLA NOIZ]

Geezer I assume you mean a set up like this? (forget price... just a search result)
http://www.ebay.com/itm/94-Honda-CBR...VX-6Mj&vxp=mtr

[ILLA NOIZ]

Or the Hyabusa set up which are indeed cheap.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/2006-Suzuki-...dYVFTf&vxp=mtr

[geezer101]

Or these which are cheaper again and all the trumpets are undamaged - http://www.ebay.com/itm/Used-1996-Ho...3D232190958949

[ILLA NOIZ]

http://www.ebay.com/itm/93-HONDA-CBR...3D232190958949

These look clean and priced right

[ILLA NOIZ]

Why is this "dead".... come on guys. Where's the prototype already?
I'm planning my build now and need answers.

[geezer101]

The CBR900RR carbs on that listing are downdraft carbs (obviously not straight down - they mount on an angle) Those are hell expensive, sets of running carbs come up under $300. All of the injection throttle bodies are literally half that.

This is a good starting point for carbs - http://www.ebay.com/itm/98-99-HONDA-...3D172164257441

[ILLA NOIZ]

Thanks! I would love to buy the manifold and carbs from Australia... but let's be honest, this is a beater/daily and not a show car. I can't justify spending $1400 just on the Carb set up. Especially if I can make these work.

[geezer101]

They are clean but I'd be concerned about the sellers' notes about the carbs overflowing and the slides being sluggish. A quad carb rack isn't something Joe Average would want to tackle for a rebuild job. As it stands they would need the mains to be jetted up and the distributor will need advance restricting. Nobody would've said bike carbs are easy to set up, but if you talk to the guys who have put the time in they will tell you it is worth the effort.

[ILLA NOIZ]

Yeah - I read that afterwards. I found a bike parts place online with fully cleaned/rebuilt for $250. Bookmarked a few pages here and there as a reminder. Along with some build threads, etc.

Some good reading here: http://www.streetsource.com/threads/...rbs-carstrucks

[geezer101]

Have a read of this as it directly relates to your model of truck and engine - http://www.sigma-galant.com/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=10169

This guy is all about numbers and efficiency (some of his work isn't pretty but it's solid) so he really goes into A/F ratios, jetting and how he has set up his ignition. There are a couple of YT videos of his carb development including a road test. Tasty

[ILLA NOIZ]

Appreciate the link. I will read this today as I plan to start piecing the parts together...
I also wonder if a small supercharger like a AMR500 could be used if a custom air box was made for the bike manifold or on a weber carb. They have a small footprint and it would be interesting to see if it would work with a low boost setup. Say 4-5psi
I see some VW guys using them albeit they have smaller displacement engines, but they run higher boost

[BradMph]

AMR500 under rated for 2600cc engine wouldn't it. 500 SC usually works on up to a 1600cc. You be starving the engine or over working the SC.

[ILLA NOIZ]

Highlight my last post to read it... not sure why the font is the same color as background? I don't see an edit or delete option

[ILLA NOIZ]

Highlight my last post to read it... not sure why the font is the same color as background? I don't see an edit or delete option

[Lon Moer]

Sorry I'm late to this thread. A HS buddy of mine was the person that got me interested in Mitsubishi.
He had a 1981 Dodge Challenger with the 2.6 4G54 and he was running a twin two barrel Mikuni side draft carburetor set-up.