I bought an old edelbrock 2x4 intake at a swapmeet a while back for my car. The motor I have in it know is relatively stock but I have another hotter motor in the works for the car as money permits and parts. My question is I have one good edelbrock 600 cfm carb and I have a bad one. I would like to put the intake on my car now just for looks. I have the rear barrels unhooked on my good carb and I was planning on doing the same with the other carb when I found a good one for cheap. But could I for the time being just run the rear carb as a primary carb then just block off the front carb with a homemade plate and set the crappy carb on there for looks untill I get the rest of my stuff. Its a low rise intake manifold and it looks like the runners are open from the front carb to the rear but its a dual plane intake manifold. I was going to run a progressive linkage on it anyway after I found some better parts. Will the car run like shit if I do this? I didn't want to run the rear barrels on either carb because I knew it would be way to much gas for my engine. I would really appreciate any help that you hambers with 2x4 set ups could give me. Or people that just know about these setups. I had a 3 carb setup for a while on my other car and until I had the cash to set it up right I ran two of the carbs blocked off for a long time. Oh yea the engine I'm using is a cookie cutter 350 chevy. The other engine with the 3 carb set up was my 255 chevy six.
Might work, the primary side of the back carb is what runs the engine with a dual quad setup with progressive linkage Frank
Should work, give it a try, all you will be out is a little labor & the price of a set of intake gaskets. Let us know how it works.
I run twin 500cfm AFB's on my "A" Coupe, and they work great! If you run just the front carb, the back 4 cylinders will receive a very lean air/fuel mixture, and not only will the engine perform poorly, but you can run the risk of having detonation in those cylinders which will break the piston ring lands and the piston rings. If it were mine, I would'nt do it until you have 2 good carbs.
As long as there is a common plenum under both carbs that feeds all cylinders, you CAN run one carb with the other blocked off...although it's definately NOT the most efficient way to run an engine! I also don't think you'll need to disable the secondaries on either carb. Vacuum secondaries carbs can be tuned or adjusted to delay secondary opening rates...and engine load will help dictate when extra cfm is required. Two 600cfm vacuum secondaries carbs on a 350 will work okay if dialed in properly (right mixture, pump settings, etc). The progressive linkage will help you out some on a milder (stock) engine, too. In short...yes, for the sake of looks you can run one functional carb and one "dummy" carb on your intake...but it will compromise performance and economy until it is properly assembled and calibrated.
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