Hot Rods 1 of a kind Merc Flathead carb set up !!!HELP!!!

I've got a stock 51 Merc 4dr, been working on it for the past few years, just a weekend garage project. I put together a carb set-up for it unlike any I've ever seen, cause I wanted a little more power and I wanted it to be different. I'm a little skittish about putting it on the car though, because it runs so good right now (stock), and because I'm not super experienced with this sort of thing. Here are some pictures of it.

As you can see its an oldschool 2x2 Fenton intake maifold, I've got adapters which I believe are Offy to bolt the original style 4-bolt carbs to it. It seems like everything is gonna fit good, I've got a generator offset mount, offset oil fill tube, two good working carbs, and a parts carb. I've also got an offset water neck, cause the generator will be in the way of one of the radiator hoses once it's moved.

I'm still not sure about a few things.
-Do I have to worry about the heat risers these carbs used for the choke?
-Can I run a stock fuel pump or do I need something else for more pressure? I already know the stock one will fit.
- General thoughts on this? Good idea? Horrible idea?

 

Franco,
OK, I see you have these two 895 carbs mounted on the manifold and have the other parts needed to make this bolt on. Here are a couple of issues I see and can foresee: 1) You have two different year carbs. I believe one is a 49 and the other if a 50. Take a look at the throttle levers. One moves forward on acceleration (rear carb) and the other moves in the opposite direction. 2) These carbs provide venturi vacuum to advance the "lodamatic" distributor used on this vintage engine. If you are using some different kind of distributor, you will need to plug the venturi ports on the carbs but keep in mind you will need some way to get advance in whatever distributor you use. 3) These carbs have a bigger venturi than the Ford 94's/Stromberg 97's so can't see how the engine could idle with two of these open from the start so I would think you need to somehow set up progressive linkage and set one carb as primary and the other as secondary and this would likely imply different jetting but I am getting beyond my pay grade here and someone else can step in on this. 4) following no. 3, one carb could have a choke and the other (secondary) not. I run with one of these carbs on my avatar and converted to a manual choke and have the heat riser blocked off. Works fine. 5) Not sure how you would set up air cleaners/filters because the front carb has to be pretty close to the rear. 6)you will be the only kid on your block with this set up-for sure.

Hope this all helps.

Pete

 

I'm just glad I'm not the only one that keeps engine parts in the bedroom!

 

Thanks Pete for your thoughts on this.
The carb closest to the camera is one of the two that i'll be using, the other in the picture is a parts carb. I'll also be using the carb currently on my car which has the "2-hole" throttle lever just like the one pictured, they are almost identical.

With regard to the venturi vacuum ports, I'll probably just have to see what works once I put everything on the engine. I am running the original style distributor.

For air cleaners, I was just gonna put some wire mesh to catch the big stuff from going into the carbs, cause no regular air cleaner is gonna fit.

Helps me sleep better at night.

 

Just noticed this post and thought I would let you know that there was a 2x2 intake made for the Merc motor that took the 4 bolt Merc carbs. One was branded under Multi and one was Weiand. I don't know if it was lost with the last upgrades to the HAMB but a few years back there was a thread about different intakes and there was a couple of them in the thread.

 

Edmunds also made a flathead dual carb manifold for 4 bolt carbs. There's one on eBay that no one seems to want. I hope I'm wrong, but your existing setup seems more oriented to the "wow" factor than any increase in performance.

 

Velocity stacks would look cool!

 

Your loadamatic dizzy is a weird design that needs a different vacume signal than most other s .The signs are not good.Iforsee overheating ,flatspots and grief .Get yerself a Pertronix and be done with the riginal thing .

 

Not exactly. A Pertronics conversion will change how the spark is generated, but not the timing. To be clear, he needs a whole new distributor with a different method of controlling the timing of the spark, either through a straight mechanical advance or a combination of mechanical and vacuum advance. It doesn't matter how the spark itself is generated, either by points or an electronic module. I prefer points myself as the Pertronics modules have proven vulnerable to the voltage spikes that can be present in generating and charging systems of older vehicles. 6 volt positive ground units in particular should be be avoided.

 

I've heard that too, but electrical wizards claim that DC generator power is a cleaner sine wave than alternator. Beats me, all I know is my battery gets charged either way. How do it know? Almost 20 years and no problems using generator w/ pertronix

No experience there, have heard that as well. The loadomatic is an interesting idea, I'm not sure why the engineers thought it would work well. Or, has anyone managed to? I'm pretty stubborn, if I had an engine that utilized it would have probably spent too much time trying to make it work just to see. Did they utilize a lot of initial timing, or just the typical 4° or 6° BTDC? I can't see how it would not have a big flat spot on acceleration. Engine or manifold vacuum of course would be critical. Did these beasts have vacuum wipers too? That could be interesting.

 

I have had a 1951 Ford club coupe for over 30 years. It was a very nice original when I got it, complete with a Load-a-matic distributor. Over the years it has been an excellent running and driving car. I would guess that over the years I have had dozens of compliments on how well the car ran. Properly set up with the right carburetor on a stock engine, the Load-a-matic is as good as anything out there. The problems only start when they are misused or neglected.

Now after saying all of this, I am in the process of installing a modified '51 Merc engine that has, among other things, a 2GC carburetor and a Mallory mechanical advance dual point. It has more of a "wow" factor, but I doubt I'll get as many compliments on how well it runs as I did before.

The Load-a-matic is a very unfairly maligned setup.

"Truck64" - FYI 4 degrees BTDC for initial timing and yes they do have vacuum wipers. I think you might have made a good point about that. Whenever I have had my wipers on, I was so busy manipulating the accelerator to get a few extra swipes on the wipers that I never noticed any degradation in performance.

 

Those are 50 and 51 carbs, the 49 has the coke on the left side. Not unique, but different.
I am in the process of restoring a 49 and a 51 with a 50 as a parts carb.

 

Stock fuel pump will work fine.

 

A quick update on this.

I hear you guys on the vacuum advance issues, guess I'll have to find a mechanical advance distributor somewhere. But if I ever do get this thing on the car I'll still try it with the original Load-a-matic first.

In the mean time
I picked up a distributor that looks like the stock Merc distributor, but is setup for dual points. All parts inside seem to have Fomoco script on them, it looks unused.

Also going to go with Edmunds aluminum heads that I managed to find. Get a few horsepowers out of those hopefully.

Will post pictures of all this stuff eventually

I would like to get some performance out of this engine, but I'm on a budget and not looking to win any races either.

 

I think you will like the Edmunds heads. They have the spark plug relocated so it is not over the exhaust valve, which allows the use of extended tip spark plugs. I use Champion 328's in mine. I have 2 sets of Edmunds heads on my engines, even though I have a set of new in the box Offenhausers on the shelf. To get the most out of them, you should massage them so you have .040-.060" squish. This is the clearance between the piston crown and the combustion chamber. Here is a link on how I did mine : https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/navarro-heads-on-a-ford-flathead.1078832/#post-12240775

 

I love things that are different. The neatest thing with this set up would be to turn the carbs 90* each facing the opposite direction. Linkage would be a pain but can be over come. Loadmatics can work with dual carbs as Ford did this for 1956 only with their dealer option of dual quads. They were however not identicl to the stock 4barrel and were not progressive but designed to work with the dual set up. Good Luck

 

Joe Buffardi of the Shifters has a similar setup on his flathead Lincoln powered roadster

I took these at the 2012 Barona drags