I just installed a 700r4 and rebuilt an 1850 holley 4160 It drives fine once moving, however when placed in reverse or drive it tries to stall the engine. If I idle the carb way up, the I can keep it alive. Once on the highway its fine but if I hit a stoplight will try to stall. It shifts fine too I tried to call TCI this morning and they were of no help. As a matter of fact this guy was rude and told me to just take it to a transmission shop to fix it. I cant seem to find any vaccuum leaks, and the fluid level in the trans is good Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated Thanks again JRODHOTROD
Can you throw a 'known' good carb on there in order to eliminate your carb rebuild as a possible cause? I believe the problem is in the carb. 'Car too light for torque converter' isn't it, since when you're idling and the brakes are holding the car stopped, the car's weight is eliminated from the equation... and the engine still wants to die.
Do you have a lockup converter? Is it disengaging? One of my old girlfriend's daily would stall at stoplights and it was the TCC(trans convertor clutch) solenoid sticking and not disengaing the lockup convertor. It was a front driver, but the symptoms sound like yours.
Wingman- lockup has been removed entirely Vicious Cycle- you are right the old carb didnt do it, but when I rebuilt and installed the holley it began to do this, what in the carb would cause this? not enough fuel? floats set too low too small of jets trash in the carb jumpy idle vaccuum leak spark plugs fouled surging fuel pump trash in the catb dies in gear(almost) too much drag on the engine vacuum leak
Tough to diagnose over the internet, but if you know what jet sizes worked good in the old carb, that's where I'd start with the new one. I doubt it's a fuel delivery or low float issue, since those would let it idle, but not go down the road well. My guess is vacuum leak somewhere. I'd yank a plug or two also, to make sure you aren't dumping a bunch of fuel down the intake.
The old carb was a quadrajet, so i couldnt tell you. do you think something in the transmission could cause this
Sure. That's why my first move would be to put a known good carb on the motor and see what happens. The result will tell you what direction to go from there.
Close your choke part way and see if this will help it to stay running. If so, you will need to increase the size of your idle tubes. If it does not make a difference, you made no mention as to what cam you have in this motor. If you put a thumper in you don't have enough stall, so you will have to increase the stall speed in your convertor.
You must be using an adapter if you changed carbs from spread bore to square bore [Q-jet to Holley] Check the adapter gaskets for a good print, so you know if you got a complete seal. Next, what power valve did you use, and what kind of cam are you running? Sounds like you have low manifold va***, and when you drop it in gear, it drops to the point of opening your power valve, which richens the mixture enough to kill the engine. A bad ballast resistor in your + coil wire will do the same thing. RPM drops, voltage drops, coil quits coiling. Hope this helps. - Mike
thank, im out there right now going throught the possibilities, goodwrench 350 stock cam, adapter to spreadbore
I had this EXACT same problem with an 85' Blazer. I installed the GM delux 350 with a Holley carb connected to the stock 700R4. As soon as I changed over to an Edelbrock it worked fine. That advice came from another friend who had switched to an Edelbrock. Not endorcing the Edelbrock stuff necessarily, Just the facts. Hope this helps you out.
plugs looked old, so I replaced them, it didnt change anything. I adjusted the idle screws, replaced all the gaskets between the carb and adapter and adapter to intake Im swapping carbs now to see what happens
The Jalopy Journal
