OK All you OLD GUYS- I am going to put this up and see who remembers and what comes back. Here goes: Back in the mid-60s in Napa, Ca there was a guy that developed a Variable Venturi Carb. His name was Roger Hill. Could be also known as James Hill. <O</O The carbs were tested on street cars and quite a few race cars on the day. They worked GREAT <O></O> I have THREE of them with some of the adaptors that were used to run them on different intake manifolds.<O></O> Story as I remember is that he sold everything to GM back then. But there were a few sets that did not go away.. I am never going to run them. Maybe someone else?<O></O> Would be good to see them back in action at some time. But First I want to see if ANYONE can tell me the Rest of the Story----------<O></O>
No relation to the "Kendig" Carb that turned into the "Predator" carb ? I have knowledge of them, but's that's as far back as I go with the Variable Venturi concept...
If I remember right there was a street version and a race version. I had a friend that put one on his Late Model as the trick of the week, after playing with it for a lot longer then I would have , he went back to a Holley like the rest of us. As a matter of fact , a guy a couple blocks away has one sitting on a shelf. Look neat but I've personally have never heard anyone use one sucessfully.
The "Fish" carb... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=3149777 And http://www.mikebrownsolutions.com/bccfish.htm
The "Kendig" Carb & it's inventor... http://www.sema.org/sema-enews/2011/19/creator-of-the-kendig-carbuertor-willard-kendig-p***es-away and http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=360557 and https://www.google.com/search?q=ken...SFIjNiwLS54GADQ&ved=0CCoQsAQ&biw=1280&bih=665
From the S.E.M.A. website- In the ’60s, in a Yettem, California barn, Kendig built the first prototype for what would become the Kendig carburetor. Martin clearly remembers when his father first explained the new design to him, jolting him out of bed at 1:00 a.m. "He was on his way from Los Angeles to Visalia and he goes, 'Marty, I came up with an idea on a carburetor,' and he said, 'this damn thing is so simple, it's hard.'" With only the mental blueprint to start with, Kendig got to work and before long the Kendig carburetor was born. The simple design proved to be a winner and found it's way under the hood of Dyno Don Nicholson's pinto in the early ’70s. It even found its way on to Rickey DeMontrond's boat when he won the USA 1 compe***ion with several Kendigs attached to the craft's high-rise manifold. Eventually, the Kendig carburetor was transformed by Pollution Control Industries into a popular unit called the Predator carburetor.
OK, Here are a few photos. Notice some of the carbs have adaptors on them and also some adaptors sitting alongside so you can see what variations are possible. Hill did not use a float bowl. Fuel pressure and a high volume pump was all that was needed to make them work.
Ive seen 2 different versions of the Hill carburator. Its been a while, but I believe the ones pictured are the earlier version. There was another version that was used by a few racers at the old Vallejo Speedway that required a special fuel pressure regulator that used a vacuum signal...not sure if the others also required a regulator.
That's right...what ever happened to Predator carbs? You used to see them in PAW ads. It seemed like they were so bad-*** that no one used them. Like, only the guys who had tons of high end parts - roller cams, Centerline wheels, tunnel rams, and aluminum heads - could afford them. The way they had that eagle or whatever it was, you knew it was hot.
HEY-- Chop 32 -- You have been there.. Yes! Vallejo Speedway-- YES the fuel pressure regulator was a key part of the setup.. Which one of the Dudleys ran them? Seems like it was not Gene, but he was an engine guy.. Maybe it was Gene-- Rod
First Id heard of Hill carbs was when a good friend found 3 of the early ones (missing various small pieces) many years ago at the Napa Steel Mill. He got them at s**** price and put them on a junk 3x2 manifold for display purposes. Not sure about the Dudleys, but I was friends with Glenn Bishop who used to run at Vallejo Speedway and he had what were supposed to be the 3rd and 4th carbs built of the second version (no regulator though)...he said his pal Larry Damitz had #1 and #2. Glen wanted to run a pair on the street and borrowed Larry's regulator to try and get one made but this never happened. Sadly, Glenn p***ed away a month or so back. I seem to remember the later versions having a slide door venturi opposed to the trap door on the earlier ones. Do you know if the early version required the regulator also?
I too had always thought the Predator to be a later (improved?) version of the Hill and Kendig carbs. In the early '80's I borrowed a buddys Predator and tried it out on my street/strip '64 Nova. The Predator, with no tuning ran the same mph as my 750 Holley, but was about 2 tenths slower in the 1/4. Initial throttle response wasnt there. There were, for lack of a better word, different "cams" that would allow you to fine tune these carbs, maybe I could have improved the low end response if I had all those pieces...
The Perdator "could" be made to run very close to a Holley WITH...some tuning..! I had one on a 409 (421 inch) in a 61 Impala. The predator has both fuel cams and adjustable upper gates or ****erflyes. The current design also has an idle circut, which takes out most of the sensitivity. Though it seemed a little slugish at the hit of the throttle, I got mine to run within about 5/6 hundredths of the 750 or the 800 Holley I had on that engine. My only complain...it was VERY sensitive to the throttle. Your heart beat in your toes would speed you up or slow you down. Just depended on your blood pressure..! Here's more info on the Hill carbutor - http://www.google.com/patents?id=rv...=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q&f=false Mike
Back in the early '70's, Ernie Burd, Jr., a friend in Vacaville had three of these carbs. If memory serves, he was involved with Roger Hill in a small block Jr. fuel dragster in the early '60's and that's where they refined and tested these carbs. He referred to the them as Hill & James carbs and I ***umed, but never asked, there were two people involved in the development of this carb. Anyway, Hill, or James if there is one, made false teeth and he cast the body for this carb. Don't know whose idea it was, but apparently Roger Hill patented it in 1965. When I moved to Oregon in 1978, I built a big block '55 Chevy street car and Ernie loaned me two of these carbs to experiment with (he didn't want to sell them). I ran one on the street for a year and, after much trial and error with fuel pressure, spring tension on the trap door and varying the number of orifices and orifice sizes in the fuel tube I finally got it dialed in and the setup worked flawlessly. Got excellent mileage and the throttle response was surprising considering it has no accelerator pump circuit. I don't know how these carbs may be related to the Kendig or Predator carbs, but I can tell you they all work on exactly the same principle.
A fellow just had a variable venturi carb at a cruise-inb a couple weeks ago on a falcon ranchero with a straight 6. I had to ask what it was as I have only heard of and never seen one. He wasn't real enthused about it.
You're mostly right except that the fuel supplied is controlled by engine air demand rather than a restriction in the return line.
There is also the Fish Carburetor, that has a similar concept and was available in the South. I remember seeing one on a four barrel intake in a '57 Chevy that was reputed to be 'fast'. Not to hijack this thread, but does anyone who is odd carburetor know anything about them? Predator carbs even sponsored a Funny Car, if memory serves. They had a reputation of being more 'race only', than 'street friendly', and I used to see them for sale both at the Long Beach Veterans Stadium Swap Meet and at The Swap Meet on the Fairgrounds at Pomona. My thinking, at the time, was even a good Holley is hard to tune and finicky at time, power valves of the smaller ones going sour so easily, to set off on a course to get through the bell curve of learning something else was no worth the effort, especially after dealing with the Amal on my old Triumph Thunderbird Bobber. And, legend has it even Winfields are a bit touchy, though once nailed they are miraculous on the older T's, A's & Flatheads.
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