I have a tri power set up for my MEL 462. There are no books on this since its from a 430 motor from 1958 but back then they had a special fuel pump with 3 ports...costs $800 for a new one so I am in no way doing that! I am using early Holly 2300 carbs. I was curious about what to expect if I used an electric fuel pump (which I have on the car now) and the trips. What would happen at WOT? I am not sure if the pump or any will provide enough fuel for the 6 pack when it opens up and when the center 2 barrel is only being used when cruising??? I am sure I need to find out some info like flow for the set up but not sure if anyone out there has any advice from setting up their tri power. Thanks a lot.
A holley red or blue pump will provide plenty of fuel, i would be a bit more worried about those carbs unless they came from a 3 -2bbl setup. They might be a problem getting sorted out.
Unless you will be running at WOT for long periods a regular fuel pump should be adequate. You have three float bowls full of fuel that you will have to run through first. Those holley bowls a pretty big. If they are not tri-power carbs you will need to sort-out the idle circuits on the outside carbs. 1. Replace the carbs with 'outside' carbs w/o idle circuits ($$$). 2. Turn the idle screws all the way in on the outside carbs. This turns the outside carbs into big vacuum leaks and you will have to tune the middle carb rich. I have done this and it works ok. It isn't optimal for gas mileage... but who cares? 3. Run on all three carbs. I haven't tried this with three carbs, but I am currently running 2 (97s) on my small block ford simultaneously.
Thanks a lot. The car will not WOT unless I want to have a little fun. I might take it to the track when I am done to see how it does but I will not drag race this thing religiously. Anyways, the carbs were actually on the previous owner's car from what he told me (or from what I remember). I will have to email him back to see. I know tri power is expensive to trying to fix what I've got will have to do for now! Appreciate the help.
The idle circuits are the easy part. Most end carbs on factory 3 deuce set ups have thicker butterflies that seal better eliminating the vacuum leaks that bug many of the 3 deuce set ups assembled from loose carbs.