The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Heating Carb.?

Members:
Changing over to headers and dual exhaust,and putting a holley 2 barrel on stock manifold. I live in S.F. bay area. Now , I have ordered a cover plate with the tube that attaches to header. I have heard that that won't heat the carb enough to reduce the refrigator effect( cooling and freezing of fuel). I have heared that water is better...I have heared I don't need one...
Please give your experience with this issue.
Thanks

Negative......using a heat plate with 2 orifices and 2 copper tubes running to the exhaust headers is the quickest and safest way to heat the H/W manifold. I've been using this system for the past 14K miles on my 235 powered 54 truck. Regardless of where you operate your engine the intake needs to be heated.....especially with the ethanol (crap) enhanced fuels.

No special "valving" is needed as the firing order of the 235 provides the differential needed for efficient exhaust heating. The other "option" is to use water heat which is slower, less efficient and if you have a leak you can be sitting beside the road waiting for a rollback. Check out the pics of my heat system in my Webshots albums. I used compression fittings, bent the tubing by hand and haven't touched it since day one.

Langdon's heat plate has the fittings correctly located and is worth the money. He is an advocate of water heat while I prefer the exhaust heat for the reasons I've stated above. It's your call.....

Dave

Dave

I used exhaust heat as well, but went with a different method, as I prefer to custom fab parts if I can. My plate was made from a sheet of stainless, approx 1/16" thick, with two 3/8" NPT fittings. Those are fed/exhausted with 3/8" steel brake line with flared fittings (no leaks). If I were to do it over, though, I would have opted for a thcker plate, as the 1/16" plate did warp a bit.

Dave: Thanks for the input and Pics. I got my headers and exhaust thru National Chevy. They are Wilson Headers. I got the heat plate...The picture shows only one copper tube. I called and they said thats all I would need. Hmmmmmmm. Why put 2 threaded holes in the headers then ?I think I'm going to ask them to send me an extra pipe so I can hook them both up.
Thanks