IDA Air Flow Between Barrels Way Off?

[snakebitekit]

this is from the Ingelese site;

For the sake of simplicity, let's look at the Weber carburetor as having three basic circuits- the idle circuit, the accelerator pump circuit and the main circuit.

The idle circuit is comprised of two components, the idle jet and the idle jet carrier. With these two pieces, the tuner can select exactly how much fuel and how much air he wants to provide the engine at idle and during the low rpm operation, while making very fine adjustments to either, if necessary. The idle mixture is delivered as a proportioned mixture whose total volume can be further regulated with the idle mixture screw, which is located on the lower part of each carburetor barrel. On a correctly-jetted idle circuit, the mixture screw on a 48 IDA is never more than 3/4 of a turn out. This will hold true 100% of the time, no matter what anyone else tells you. If you have to go more than that, you'd better heavy-up the idle jet. Even if you get it to idle, going more than 3/4 turn tells you the jet is lean and you're going to have other drivability problems, which brings us to the next part of the idle jet's function.

The idle circuit in the Weber isn't just an idle circuit - it does more than that. It is actually the circuit which must carry the engine all the way up to about 2,800-3,000 rpm, where the transition to the main circuit take place. That means if you don't drive over 3,000 rpm, you're only running on the idle jets. After 3,000 rpm or so, the idle circuit is entirely bypassed and no longer has anything to announce. So, if you have a tuning problem that "goes away" after about 3,000 rpm, that tells you to play with the idle circuit. Or maybe the opposite is true. Either way, it's very cut and dried as far as the two circuits are concerned - so isolating the problem is a breeze.

One the most frequently experienced "gremlins" with Weber carburetors is a seemingly incurable and very annoying flat spot which rears its ugly head at about 2,200-2,800 rpm. This condition is generally caused by one of two things - you either have the wrong emulsion tube in the carburetor, which is causing a rich stumble due to an under-emulsified mixture at that particular rpm range or the idle circuit is falling off too early to carry the engine up to the point where the main circuit can take over, leaving a "lean hole". In simple terms, the idle circuit is going lean too early. Either condition is easily rectified. In the case of the emulsion tube, there are really only a few which work really well for V8 applications; and if you aren't using one of them it is certainly a big part of the problem. If the flat spot is still there even with the correct emulsion tube, then you'll need to richen up the idle circuit. This is sometimes a tricky area, because the first thing you want to do is throw in a bigger idle jet, but sometimes playing with air bleeds, mixture screws, or choke sizes can accomplish the same thing while sticking with the original jet size. Seeking a little bit of sound advice here can save a lot of time and hassle. The point here is that these carburetors are designed to come off idle and run smoothly all the way up. Your problems can be solved with a little tuning on your own or by relating the symptoms to someone who is knowledgeable enough to help you. Remember, these carburetors will do just about anything you want them to, except maybe wash your socks.

The accelerator pump circuit, just like on any carburetor, is responsible for eliminating "bog" and making a passing maneuver without a hesitation or stumble. The circuit also has two basic elements. These are the pump exhaust valve and the pump jet. The pump exhaust is nothing more than a bypass valve and this is located in the bottom of the float bowl. This is the piece that regulates how much fuel you want to make available when you need that pump shot. Putting a bigger bypass hole in the valve allows more fuel to bleed back into the float bowl instead of out of the shooters. The smaller the hole, the more fuel you're making available. You can even put in a "closed" bypass for drag racing, when you need all the juice you can get in order to get those slicks turning. Obviously, there is nothing complicated about a simple bypass system. The duration of the pump shot is varied by installing a larger or smaller pump jet (shooter). Larger pump jets give a heavy blast over a short period, while the smaller ones will give a finer, longer-duration shot. As long as you leave the bypass valve alone, you're still getting the same overall volume. In most cases, the stock pump jets can be left alone.

Don't know it helps but is a great article.