[JohnnyC]

The original qjet on my t/a has officially been retired and sometime in the next few months I will have it sent away to be rebuilt when i do other upgrades. For now though i need a carb, so i have been looking on ebay and have seen some good deals, but most of them are rebuilt qjets and such for chevy's, olds, etc. My question is other than they will obviously be calibrated for a different engine, is there any reason that a qjet from a chevy 454, or one from and olds or buick 455 would not work on my car? I just want to make sure before i try to get one to use to hold me over. Thanks guys.

[carbking]

To echo Cliff's comments; Rochester did not enter the aftermarket market. The O.E. carbs were very finely tuned for the specific applications. When you change the application, either by putting a non-original carb on your original engine, or using an original carb with your modified engine; you become your own design engineer.

Concerning the rebuilt "good deals" on ebay: they CAN be a good deal under a couple of conditons. You KNOW the rebuilder, and you have the specific application for which the carb was designed. Otherwise, a used core would be just as good for your purpose.

Jon.

[Cliff R]

Forget any commercially "remanufactured" q-jets, even if the sport the correct Pontiac numbers. For every one report we get that they work OK, we get 100 reports that they are nothing but a POS. I haven't seen one it at least 15 years that was worth the cost of the box it was delivered in. They are completely "butchered", full of generic parts and most are disabled beyond where it is cost effective to bring them back.

There are plenty of late model q-jets available. We prefer the 1976 and later carbs for serious high performance use. I use a 1977 Pontiac carb on my own engine and sent a near identical 1978 unit to Jim Hand that he uses on his Wagon. These later carbs have very good features in addition to a better overall design and material than early units. Not to mention they are not as old and weathered. The only drawback to them is that they were very limited on fuel delivery due to emission standards in place in later years.....Cliff

[Goatless69]

I have spent several years trying to "acheive" a good Q-jet for my 69 GTO conv. The one I bought on e-bay wasn't even goog enough to use as a core. My latest attempt involved buying an old Buick 800 cfm with APT from a guy at a local auto parts store. I had Cliff R do the throttle shafts and provide some additional advice and the carb works great. I would suggest only buying something you can look at and have Cliff R do it right for your specific needs.

John

[JohnnyC]

The original qjet on my t/a has officially been retired and sometime in the next few months I will have it sent away to be rebuilt when i do other upgrades. For now though i need a carb, so i have been looking on ebay and have seen some good deals, but most of them are rebuilt qjets and such for chevy's, olds, etc. My question is other than they will obviously be calibrated for a different engine, is there any reason that a qjet from a chevy 454, or one from and olds or buick 455 would not work on my car? I just want to make sure before i try to get one to use to hold me over. Thanks guys.

[JohnnyC]

Hey Ragtop,
Thanks for the reply,, and yes, I have already planned for along time to have cliff ruggles redue my original qjet that is now useless to me because the accelerator pump will not work. I don't want to do that though untill I am ready to make all my other performance upgrades, in the mean time the weather is getting nice and i want to be able to drive my car, so I am really just looking for a compatible carb to hold me over, and i don't want a holly, etc. or anything that will not allow me to use the hood scoop, have to modify to electric chocke or anything else. And I am kind of between a rock and hard place now because everyone has been telling me to stay away from an ebay qjet or things similar, on the other hand i don't want to pay 350 or so for a new edelbrock, or edelbrock reconditioned qjet when in another two months i am going to spend the same amount give or take to get my original car redone.

[JohnnyC]

Thanks for all of the info guys. I guess in my situation now I will only look for a qjet redone for a 400 similar to mine, or possible look into maybe getting a edelbrock, as i understand i won't be able to use a holly with my hood scoop. All in all, i am just looking for something to hold me over so i can drive my car untill i am ready in another month or two to make other upgrades and have my original qjet rebuilt according to the performance needs I have.

[JohnnyC]

thanks for all the replies, I really appreciate everyones help and opinions. Also, thanks for that info 73transaman, and yes i suppose that will limit what i am looking for if i will need a 75 or later qjet to use my stock shaker base. Do you know if an edelbrock universal carb is compatible with the stock shaker base, I could have sworn i have seen a couple t/a's equipped that way.

[Goatless69]

The comment about the auto parts store carb is interesting. My impression is that the carb will work ok, just not optimal. They use the same part number for muti-year applications. When looking for a 2 bbl carb several years ago at an Autozone, I didn't like the look of the repairs done on the support for the air cleaner mounting stud. Looked at 3 of them and decided mine was no worse than theirs. I just rebuilt mine and the car ran fine. Internet information seemed to indicate that these repairs are used more frequently because good cores are harder to find. I would think that one of these carbs will allow you to drive your car around until you're ready to do the other one right. The only other option would be to search the classified ad papers in your area for a good "front inlet" carb with the correct inlet fitting size and rebuild it yourself. You will need to buy the Doug Roe book (almost essential), carb from a similar model year, and rebuild kit.

Maybe the auto parts store carb would be the easiest. They are supposed to make your car run, otherwise everyone would return them.

[73transamman]

You mentioned a couple of times that you wanted to use your stock air cleaner with your replacement carb. I think that will limit your options because the air horn on the carb has a vent that fits a hole in the base. so you need to find a Pontiac carb that is 75 or later.

[JohnnyC]

once again, thanks to everybody for taking the time to give there opinion. Now, after reading cliff's last post i really don't know what to do, i don't like to hear that my chances of getting a decent carb remanufactured commerciallly are 1 in 100. On the other hand, how long will it take to have mine redone professionally? Being the time of year it is, i would imagine awhile, so how can i drive my car in the mean time? Come mid to late may i will be doing some serious performance upgrades, maybe even an engine swap, nothing if for sure yet, but in any case my car will be down for a while then, so you can see where i need to get my carb situation figured out somehow so i can at least drive it through the rest of april and early may. Thanks guys.

[Cliff R]

All factory q-jets are application specific. It's hit and miss when you purchase one and try to use it outside of the original application. Same thing with making extensive engine/drivetrain modifications, then trying to use the factory carb. It's the biggest single reason why q-jets get a bad rap. In reality, when correctly calibrated they are fantastic street/strip carburetors.

Those carb are on E-rape AND good deals for a reason......Cliff

[Hattmann68]

Its always been you get what you pay for and sometimes you get lucky and come out ahead.The rebuilds in part stores are usually somebody junk that are fixed up or traded in as core's. Its always best to either find a person who does rebuilds and understands Qjets, or buy some manuals and get advice and rebuild them yourself. I always do as much of the rebuilding work on my cars. Its always better to understand as much as you can even if you never take on apart. Good luck.

[GTOLou]

I know this may sound crazy, but I bought a replacement carb from Advance Auto, about $130.00 bucks and it works great. I read some info on from Hands book about relaxing the spring on the secondaries and using my dremel to notch the secondary flapper valves. Also placed my 68/69 secondary rods in it - it runs much better than the old carb.

My original 68 carb had the leaking well problem (hard cold and hot starting). A local guy rebuilt it for me and didn't fix this problem - I'm not sure it runs any better than before the rebuild.

My 69 gto has a 400 that runs well - but I've got long term plans for a stroker and will ultimately have Cliff build my 68 or another 69 carb that I have for that motor - But, for now the rebuilt rochester from Advance runs amazingly well.

[shaker455]

The buick carb would be the closest match, chevy carbs usally and not even close to drop on your car as almost every aspect of them need to be modified for your appiclation

[Junkyard Dog]

Which, of course, can be corrected, right Cliff?