When Did Four Barrels Overtake Multi-carb. Set-ups?

3, 6, or 8 deuces look great...but four barrels are easy to tune and make good power. When did they start becoming prevalent on rods?

 

The last year for tri-power on a GTO was 1967.There were alot of serious horsepower single 4 barrel factory muscle cars.Looking at a 1967 Popular Hotrodding magazine,there were a couple of cars with dual quad tunnel rams in there.Tunnel rams were popular until the early eightiesIn that 1967 issue,there was also a Pontiac powered "T" pickup with a single 4 barrel.

Build a neat air cleaner,or find some obscure factory piece and run the 4 barrel.Another option is a Holley 3 barrel,mainly a race carb made from about 1966 to 1971 or so.Then you would have something different.

 

4 brl, both single & dual, were available in the early 50s, so it didn't take long for people useing "new" engines to start running them. 3x2 did linger as a factory option on some engines till the early 70s

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/HOLL...33550QQitemZ8001496196QQrdZ1QQsspagenameZWDVW

Here is a Holley 3 barrel I speak of.

 

Pretty sure that was '66, actually. I don't believe there was ever a tri-power 400 Pontiac. That really stemmed from a GM ban on mult-carb setups (with the exclusion of the 3x2 Corvette 427) and indicates how ingrained the multi-carb look still was in the high-performance mindset.

In any case, I always tend to think of '62 as the beginning of the end for multi-carb setups. When Chevrolet started mounting a Holley 4-bbl on the 327 instead of twin WCFBs like on the 283, that should have been a clear message to hot rodders that there was no point in making a serious effort with multi-carb setups any longer. That is, assuming they didn't sit up and take notice of the introduction of the 4150 Holley on the '57 T-bird.

That being said, I still feel justified in running a 3-Rochester setup on my '68 Camaro, simply because a lot of old school rodders (and neophytes who only knew what they'd seen looked cool) wouldn't give up on the multi-carb issue. Three twos lingered on in the Corvette until '70 and into the seventies on certain Mopars, as was previously mentioned.

 

That thing is neat, but does that 950 represent the flow? If so, yikes!

 

they never over took em.... in my eyes alteast, LOL.. that 3 barrel is cool shit though...

 

4bbl carbs started coming stock on GM cars in the early 50's- Edelbrock offered a 4bbl manifold for flatheads by the late 50's. Detroit Racing had a 2 x 4 bbl for Caddy's in 53 or 54.

Strombergs and multiple 2 bbls hung in there because of more precise tuneability and jetting- As 4 bbl technology improved, 2bbls went out for the performance/ racing crowd- Probably by early to mid 60's

 

The three barrel Holleys were primarily oval track carbs as I recall. It was an effort to get more airflow at WOT. I've got one packed away somewhere in all of my crap that I moved out from the old shop. If I find it I'll probably put it up in the classifieds so anyone building a HAMB gas rail can give the competition something to piss and moan about. Should be real easy to disguise as a Stromberg 97.


Frank

 

You are correct,tri power was not installed on Gto's in '67.Chrysler did have a six pack on some of the 1970 340's.

 

i would guess maybe around 66 67 ish ....i mean all of the big motor cars were 2 4bbl.....as in 409 427 426 425 (well maybe not the buick....haha) you would think the trickle down effect would result....there probably weren't a lot of hot rods running around in 63 or 64 with a 427 high riser.....or a 426 hemi.....but probably a couple years later the stuff would be a little more avalible....just a guess....as its before my time......ha brandon

 

After reading the answers, I noticed your question had to do with when they started showing up on rods - not when three deuces last appeared on factory stuff...

Log style manifolds were popular in the mid to late 50's for low pressure drop at WOT for strip cars; they found their way onto street rides as the 'ultimate' setup in the late 50's/early 60's.

Rodders are a pretty sharp bunch (even tho were not all that pretty) and quickly figured out a 4 barrel carb ran as well as three deuces - and stayed in synch ALL the time. By the time Detroit was pushin' out big inch motors in the early mid 60's (63-64) the rodding community had moved on to single quad/dual quad setups for speed.

That doesn't mean log manifolds weren't used or not available; it's just that around then the folks that went fast shifted to 4 barrel tech. Detroit was on a 3 year lag from development to intro, so's the last of the deuce manifolds lingered on into '67.

 

My Ol' man was convinced by the time he bought the '64 GTO that the single 4 was the way to go for running on the street ... Got ta say that thing kicked a lot of ass .... Screwed the value a bit though ...

 

When the single 4bbl CFMs surpassed multi-carb setup's CFMs, and the racers switched to single 4s. The early 4bbls were quite small. The 60's saw the change, and that's when all of those really ugly fake injection and scoop aircleaners for 4bbls came out.


Mutt