WAITER, there's a Bug in my Carburetor!
Copyright 1997, by Harry Pellow, All Rights Reserved.

It seems that Others out there have said that "the Maestro doesn't like Zenith or Solex Carbs. He only likes Weber Carburetors."

.....Now, let the Maestro speak in his own tongue and let not others put words in his mouth:

.....Yes, it's True! He admits it! The Maestro likes Weber Carburetors.

.....He ALSO likes good Solex and Zenith Carburetors too!

.....(Note that the operative word in the above sentence is "good".)

.....When Solexes and Zeniths are Good, they're great. And when Solexes and Zeniths aren't good, they can be Very, Very Bad!

.....But Solexes and Zeniths are Original! And ifin you REALLY want to Win the Concours, it helps to be Original. (Like the guy with one of the Maestro's Gold Plated Engines that won the Palo Alto Concours,... more than once! The non-Porschephile Concourse Judge liked the Gold better that the Original Silver Cad of his five competitors. Leading to the Rule: he who has the Gold, not only makes the Rules but wins the Concours too.)

.....Ah, but what about a Real Porsche Concours- there you GOTTA be Original to win. And that means- Zeniths and Solexes. And ifin yours are Bad, and set the Judges' White Coats on fire from manifold backfires, you've got a Problem.

.....Fortunately, the Maestro has a Solution for bad Zeniths or Solexes- a MaestroMaster Carburetor Rebuild! Which magically makes good-running Solexes and Zeniths out of what had been Very, Very bad running Solexes and Zeniths. For but a modest investment.

.....However, ifin you're NOT climbing the concours ladder and just want to DRIVE the car. And say, you're living in an Area of the Country "blessed" with oxygenated gasoline that comes and goes with the seasons, you'll find that changing the Main Jets or the Air Correction Jets makes your 356 run better.

.....And ifin you've ever changed a Main Jet in a Solex or a Zenith, you'll note that the entire contents of the Float Bowl gushes out like a Mississippi flood- all over what used to be your Concours Sheet Metal and onto your new Spark Plug Wires, on its way to your hot exhaust pipe.

.....Nowadays with the Methyl Tertiary Butyl Ether oxygenated gasolines have, a float bowl full of today's gas might put you to sleep before the fire starts.

.....However, ifin you happen to have a set of Weber Carburetors, you can change the Main Jet (and air correction and Emulsion Tube) in less that 30 seconds per hole! With a dime. Or a screwdriver ifin you're broke and out of dimes. And NO gas leaks anywhere!

.....Try THAT on your Zenith or Solex! In less than 10 fun-filled, gasoline-drenched minutes per carburetor.

.....Webers are meant to be adjusted, played with, raced with, have fun with, so the adjustments are made with some forethought. Like you might not want to drain racing gas all over what had just been a red-hot exhaust manifold!

.....Buy, hey, The Customer is Always Right. Ifin he wants a Concours set of Solexes or Zeniths, no Problem- the Maestro has them In Stock. And ifin The Customer wants Weber Carbs- either the 40 or 44IDF's, again, No Problem, for The Customer Is Always Right. After all, it's your money. And you may as well get what you want!

.....Anyhow, like everything else, Webers have gone through several evolutionary versions- mostly with the intent of improving the breed. Years ago Webers had a lousy 2-position accelerator pump- giving you too much and WAY too much gas, or Too much and Not Enough.

.....All Zeniths and Solexes had infinitely adjustable accelerator pumps- so one could screw them up in infinite number of ways.

.....Weber soon saw the advantage of this and some 10 years ago added infinitely adjustable accelerator pumps.

.....As Time marches on, Tempus is Fugiting. About 5 years ago, the Weber Jet Stacks sprouted a 1" extension so they stood above the top of the carb. This made removal of the jet stack a lot easier than when they were flush with the carb top. (Year ago, with flush-mounted brass just carriers, unscrewing them was a cinch, but getting the bastards out of the hole was a real pain. And no, a magnet won't work- 'cause the jets and carrier are brass!)

.....They fixed that with the 1" extension. Now, the only thing the Maestro doesn't like about Webers today is that the importer insists on supplying Linkage Arms that wedge a 2/3 throttle. After telling the importer repeatedly about the wedging linkage arms and being told repeatedly by the Importer that "Nobody else ever had this problem before", the Maestro gave up and made up linkage arms that Go All The Way Down! Giving you Full Throttle, 'cause you deserve it.

.....However, everything is not always Perfect in Weberland. Though the Vast Majority of Webers work well out of the box, or with a minor jet change, every now and then the Maestro gets a Bad One. A Bad New One.

.....And has to return said Defective Weber back to the Importer. And it's always like pulling hen's teeth to get the Weber Importer to replace the Bad Weber.

.....The usual sequence is that the reluctant Importer grudgingly gives the Maestro a Return Authorization Number. And the Maestro sends the carb back. And waits. After a couple of weeks, the Maestro calls the importer, about the status of the replacement Weber, and the importer says "Oh, well our Loco experts flow tested your "bad" Weber and can't find anything wrong with it.

.....And the Maestro asks his usual question- "Did your Loco experts put the Weber on a CAR and DRIVE it??? To which the answer is always "no, the flow bench is all they need. To which the Maestro says- "only if the flow bench has WHEELS on it driven by an engine that's being fed by that Carburetor!"

.....Ah, but there was one time back in the Summer of '93 when a Man From Reno ordered a set of Webers from the Maestro, and the Maestro contracted with his Porsche Specialist Subsidiary in Reno to install them. And after much fussing around it was determined that one Cylinder would do absolutely NOTHING at idle, despite having proper compression and Spark. That left the carb as the culprit.

.....The Maestro's Reno Subsidiary even tore into the new Weber to see why the Hell no fuel was getting through the Idle Circuit. And what did he find when he peered down the idle passageway?

.....He found a Bug.

.....A very Dead Bug, but a bug nonetheless. One whose body parts were blocking the idle passageway. He cleaned the carcass out, reassembled the Weber and fired it up- and guess what?

.....That cylinder STILL wouldn't fire.

.....It was time to call the Maestro.

.....And the Maestro realized that though most of the Bug had been removed, some bug body parts were probably deep inside. This was a definite Warranty Claim. So the Maestro shipped off another New Weber (this time with no bug inside), to Reno, and the Engine ran like it was supposed to.

.....And this time when the Maestro made his warranty claim, he bragged that nor only did the New Weber have a Bug in it, and not only had the Maestro's Reno Subsidiary FOUND THE BUG, but that the Bug was enclosed! In plastic. In the box with the returned Weber.

.....The Maestro wondered how the Weber Importer was a-gonna wiggle out of THIS one

.....Then the Maestro's Center of Higher Reasoning had a horrible thought! Suppose, just suppose the Weber Importer contacts with the best Entomologist in Southern California that the University of Spoiled Children has to offer, and the guy finds that the bug was of Domestic Design. Then it could be a Reno June Bug or some such that would certainly VOID THE WARRANTY!

.....The Maestro sweated and waited the require two weeks and caller back the importer.

....."Remember me," said the Maestro. "The guy with the returned Weber with the Bug. And the Bug in the the plastic bag?

.....Oh yes, said the Importer. Well, we sent the Bug out to a famous Entomologist at the University of Spoiled Children to see where it came from. And he said it was an Italian Wine Beetle!

.....And since Italian Wine Beetles aren't normally found in Reno, we're gonna send you another Carburetor.

.....The Maestro was overjoyed- they accepted his warranty claim and send his another Weber. See, good things do happen ifin you get the Bugs out and:

..... KEEP THE 356 FAITH!!!
 

 

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