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Zenith carbs needed

S

sunalp60

Hi everyone. This is my first time on the forum. I have a 59 Series I Alpine with dual Zenith carbs. I'm have problems with rough idle and gas leaking from the lower posts. Looking down the throtle bore, I can see gas dripping onto the lower throtle plate. I've rebuilt the carbs with the standard rebuild kits with no success. Does anyone a good pair of Zeniths to sell or know someone who will rebuild them for a reasonable price? I appreciate any help.

Tim Stiffy
Bentleyville, PA
 

RootesRacer

Donation Time
Hi everyone. This is my first time on the forum. I have a 59 Series I Alpine with dual Zenith carbs. I'm have problems with rough idle and gas leaking from the lower posts. Looking down the throtle bore, I can see gas dripping onto the lower throtle plate. I've rebuilt the carbs with the standard rebuild kits with no success. Does anyone a good pair of Zeniths to sell or know someone who will rebuild them for a reasonable price? I appreciate any help.

Tim Stiffy
Bentleyville, PA

Gas leaking onto the throttle plates is usually indicative of fuel level being too high, often due to a leaking solder seal on the floats themselves.
 
S

sunalp60

I will check the floats. Could they be adjusted to high allowing gas to overflow the bowl? Do you know the heigth that they should be?

Thanks for everyone's input.

Tim
 

RootesRacer

Donation Time
I will check the floats. Could they be adjusted to high allowing gas to overflow the bowl? Do you know the heigth that they should be?

Thanks for everyone's input.

Tim

Hell yes they could be adjusted to overflow, but if they were once correct, and suddenly are not, it could be that gas got into the float through a corroded solder joint.

Been there done that.

See your workshop manual for details.
 
S

Steve Kirk

The way to test the float is to place it in water and see if it sinks. I had a leak on my series 5 recently. I placed the float from the carb into water and one side sank.

The problem I have found with rebuilding the Zeniths is that the spindles and bushings wear and these are not available.

Steve
 

alpine_64

Donation Time
The carbs also have a tendancy to oval the throttle bodies. You end up reboring them and making larger butterflys to correct this... expensive.
 
S

sunalp60

Zeinth Carbs

Has anyone ever tried grooving the shafts and fitting o-rings to seal off the air or gas leakage?
 

Wombat

Donation Time
Years ago I had the 150 CDS Strombergs on my Hillman Hunter GT reconditioned by a carb shop here in Sydney. They bored out the throttle spindle holes and fitted teflon (i think) bushes. They also bored our the carb throat to make sure it was on the same centre as the throttle shaft and fitted oversize butterflies and new shafts. It worked well, but the car didn't last long enough for me to comment on the long term durability of this fix.
 

skywords

Donation Time
The way to test the float is to place it in water and see if it sinks. I had a leak on my series 5 recently. I placed the float from the carb into water and one side sank.

The problem I have found with rebuilding the Zeniths is that the spindles and bushings wear and these are not available.

Steve

Steve
One up on that method is to emerse them in a clear glass of almost boiling water and the pressure will build in them and make bubbles avoiding water entrapment in the floats. No bubbles no leaks.
 

skywords

Donation Time
Nice concept, but I believe the stress on the o-ring would be too great.

I have seen carbs with orings on the shafts (I think) Bings if remember correctly. I like the teflon bushing idea maybe delron is an option also. The remake of the butterfly would be a very difficult / task getting a fit without excessive air leakge.
 

husky drvr

Platinum Level Sponsor
The remake of the butterfly would be a very difficult / task getting a fit without excessive air leakage.
__________________
Rick Barter


Rick,

The butterfly might not be that big of a problem if Weber 38 DGAS blades could be fitted to modified Zenith bases.
 

sunbeam74

Silver Level Sponsor
I am wondering if the use of Weber 34 ICH carbs would be the easiest conversion for a "direct bolt on" to the original twin Zenith Manifold. Technically, these carbs can be found for less than $130 and sometimes as low as $100 new. Which means you could have a fresh set for about $250.00. I haven't tried but I know Robert Jarsma is planning on using these on his Venizia. These are carbs commonly used to replace the Zeniths on Land Rovers. There are other advantages to - assuming you could get the jetting right - they will flow better than the DGV and they look close to stock.

Here's some links:

http://landy.wordpress.com/2007/02/28/carburator-for-series-land-rover/

http://www.carburetion.com/weber/weberpartscarb.asp

http://www.redlineweber.com/html/Tech/34_ICT_tunning.htm

http://www.racetep.com/webercarbjet.html


Any one try these 34's? If it did work it would be a good bit cheaper than the DGV wih a new manifold. I suspect that no one has really pursued this solution since Solex manifolds were readily available and it is easier to deal with the single DGV's linkage versus the two ICH's. The thought of looking original and having better performance sounds appealing.



Steve
 

bernd_st

Bronze Level Sponsor
Actually I´m getting Zenith spindles as well as choke spindles remanufactured over here in Germany. Used them for several rebuilds already. They are not cheap - specially made from original type brass- but definitely worth it. If you are interested I can get you a quote (P.S. The bushes wear very rarely in most cases it´s the spindles)

Bernd (from Germany)
 
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