Making a single 4bbl look "Good"?

I ran a dual quad last year, for the look mainly. As we all know, driveability is good, performance is good, heck, even mileage was good with the progressive linkage. Alas, the single 4bbl did it all better, it just didn't look right on an open engine vehicle, you know?

Basically, what I want to do is make it look like something else, make an air cleaner that covers the carb and all (I run Edelbrock, they aren't that pretty...). I believe the munsters coach had a single 4 under all those carbs, I heard that once, but am not positive.

I'd like to do something like a weber downdraft lookalike, velocity stack style. Summit make something that's "Alright", but it's too modern looking and doesn't appear to cover the carb.

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-G3029/

Anyone have any neat ideas? Thanks!

 

put a scoop on it.
http://www.summitracing.com/parts/SUM-G3021/

 

Gut a blower case and slip it over it .
I put one those small fake hilborn looking scoops in top my edelbrock and I think it looks pretty good for simple and not to much work or money , but multi carbs soon to fallow anyways

 

2 words...air cleaner.

Get creative. Find one off of say, a 59-60 Caddy. HUGE! Add an extra snorkel and make sure they both face the same way when installed. Corvettes had a simple dual snorkel (I think it was Vettes) where 2 slender snorkels pointed forward. Some trick paint and striping, you're happenin. Maybe chrome the top and paint the bottom. The possibilities are endless. Anythings better than a credit card add-on. My personal opinion of the Hilborn lookin scoops on single 4bbls, uh, I'll keep it to myself.

 

I'm not generally a fan of trying to make an induction system look like something it isn't. My advice is to find a good-looking air cleaner housing of some sort and use it. Take a look at this:



That's a "Retro Oldsmobile-Cadillac Air Cleaner" from Speedway motors, though I bet you can get them other places, too. Painted to look good with the rest of the car (maybe pin-striped or something) these can dress up an engine quite a bit. It's also large enough to mostly hide the carb and looks like a 50's era piece ... well, sort of.

 

If you take a look at a lot of the late 50's Hot Rod magazines there were just as many people running 4bbls as there were running multi carb setups. Some guys switched over to Cadillac Carbs because of their large CFM rating. I got to see a lot of inspiration from those books and it made me proud of the 4bbl that I would be running on my '35. Since it's not a focal point as a 4 x 2 intake would be I would say keeping it simple would be your best bet. Simple air cleaner cover and a clean intake with neatly run lines and such would do the trick.

My '26 runs a 4bbl (no other choice) and has a simple air cleaner and everything is pretty tidy engine wise.

Grabowski's Lightning Bug also ran a 4bbl on top of a GMC blower which looked awesome.

There are ways to do it and I think keeping it simple and neat is the way to go.

 

Here is a pic before I bought the car. I cleaned up all the lines, blasted and painted the intake, painted the valve cover valleys and kept the same air cleaner. I think that this is the coolest air cleaner with the exception of a mushroom top that Grabowski used.

 

JeffreyJames, that chrome air cleaner does look good on there.

 

Perhaps another alternative would be to determine WHY the single four outperforms the dual quad. With properly selected and tuned carbs, the dual four should at least be equal to the single quad. And really should be better, although if the single quad is perfect, you may not be able to "feel" the improvement of the dual quad.

Jon.

 

Here's a single 4bbl that looks really tough, won't have to "hide" it, either.

http://www.barrygrant.com/pr/INDUCTION_MADNESS_BadMan.htm

 

Here is my engine after I painted the valve covers and cleaned it up. The red Fuel line was just there so I can troubleshoot the car. I later ran hardline neatly tucked to the block.

 

Here's the Lightnin' Bug Clones

 

I don't know why people shy away from the single 4 barrel. To me a single 4 has always been strictly business and there's nothing wrong with that. Put a nice plain chrome air filter housing on it and your good. Also those cadillac batwings are freaking huge and I really don't like em on anything BUT a cadillac but that's just me. In short do what you think looks good not what someone else thinks looks good.

 

Hi,

You might try going to HotHemiHeads.com and look at the Garlits injection-look kits there.

Jan in Ojai CA
1952 Plymouth Suburban with 392 hemi

 

I think the caddy air cleaner would be the best looking, but what ever you do, please DON'T do the fake blower thing mentioned above.

 

Caddy Air cleaner is just so superfluous. It just looks like you are trying to dress up a turd unless it's running on a Cad V8 engine especially on an open car. It's to big and draws too much attention. But as everyone stated, it depends on taste.

 

I feel your pain, but fake is fake. Don't do Weber-look or gutted blower junk. I love the Cad air cleaners, but I don't think they look right in a hoodless car.

If the single 4-bbl works best, I'd just use one of Dave Wolk's nice air cleaners (looks like the one on the Grabowski car).

 

Is that a '64 300?

 

I've always been partial to the small Mopar cleaners.

 

Tis, I actually think it's a '65 but yeah same deal. Love these motors but there nothing for them. I wish I could run a dual quad or something. Might look into adapting a 4-71 with a small dual quad setup on top some day.

 

Lots of ideas so far. I guess I forgot some information. The engine is open in the bed of my truck (build thread in my sig) and it is a 455 olds, so something big does work. The Caddy is big, but the look is hit and miss with me. I checked out some of those fake hilborn setups... WOW! they look, well, alright, but they cost a mint.