Charger ´69 440cid & Holley Street Avenger and spark advance adjustment

[Charger´69]

Today I little bit examined my Chargers engine adjustments.. I increased sparking advance from 5 degrees before to 10 degrees before (I read from here that 14 degrees before would be good for 440cid but I didn´t dare to increase that much sparking advance because there was only 5 degrees before). It raised idle 200rpm so I had to adjust idle rpm a little bit lower.. Tomorrow I´ll go driving it and check how it feels and check that it doesn´t start knocking now because of increased sparking advance.

I have this Holley Street Avenger adjustment manual:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/9376128/Holley-Street-Avenger-Carburetor-Manual

I adjusted also cold start rpm because it was a little bit too high (almost 2000 rpm). Now it´s fine, something 1500-1600rpm. Works fine.

Now my question is, that should I also adjust primary float?  Car works very well, it starts always immediately and when cruising it works like a clock. But when I checked the primary float, it was too high (manual side 11)  When I looked "sight window" it was full of fuel, and I understood that fuel level should be at the bottom edge of the sight window. So, should I adjust it because car works very well?  I think I should do it, because doesn´t it run rich now because primary fuel float is too high? I don´t know what would be reasonable now 

[Charger´69]

Doesn´t anyone know what is reasonable to do now? 

I used google and read many articles about this, and I found out first that Holley´s Street Avenger isn´t maybe the best carb what you can get  but also that float level adjustment is the first thing to do when tuning carb, so I´ll do it today later. I´ll get some sleep first (I´ve been in work in night shift and clock is here in Finland almost 6 AM) and then I´ll go to dentist  and then I´ll set the float level right  That is easily done to this kind of Holley..

I just hope that after that Charger will work fine or even better than now, because it really works great now but however I want to adjust carb as it mentioned to be adjusted.

And why I ask here these simple carb tuning tips is that I´m novice with carb equipped engines because my previous cars that I´ve adjusted have almost all been injected and that world is very familiar to me. Now I´ll just have to learn also this "carb world" because ´69 Chargers wasn´t available with injected engines  And I like carb setups because there is no ugly wires and computers all over the car 

[Brock Samson]

What size is your St. Avenger?..  Mine is a 770 on top of a Weiand Stealth manifold. Mine bolted up just fine without any real extensive adjustments, of course i've raised and lowered the idle just to see,.. and it was actually better out of the box then after i fiddled with it... So I set it back...
What do you know about your engine and any mods made to it?.. has it had a rebuild?.. it's an Auto?.. What gears in back?.. you have a cam, is it stock magnum or a six pack or what?.. what the exhaust system like?.. stock?.. most important is how it's running..  how does it sound?.. Gas mileage?.. is it burning too much gas, how do the plugs look, have you inspected them?..
Does it seem to need adjustment?..
Nice car congrats on the delivery and it being a 99% great paint job... like to see alot more pics besides the front three quarter view, especially the engine and Interior.
There are far more qualified experts on here then I, I suspect they will chime in soon enough.

[Charger´69]

What size is your St. Avenger?..  Mine is a 770 on top of a Weiand Stealth manifold. Mine bolted up just fine without any real extensive adjustments, of course i've raised and lowered the idle just to see,.. and it was actually better out of the box then after i fiddled with it... So I set it back...
What do you know about your engine and any mods made to it?.. has it had a rebuild?.. it's an Auto?.. What gears in back?.. you have a cam, is it stock magnum or a six pack or what?.. what the exhaust system like?.. stock?.. most important is how it's running..  how does it sound?.. Gas mileage?.. is it burning too much gas, how do the plugs look, have you inspected them?..
Does it seem to need adjustment?..
Nice car congrats on the delivery and it being a 99% great paint job... like to see alot more pics besides the front three quarter view, especially the engine and Interior.
There are far more qualified experts on here then I, I suspect they will chime in soon enough.

It is Holley Street Avenger 670cfm vacuum with electric choke.

I was told that engine is ´69 Dodge Monacos (police model?) 440cid Magnum with a little bit more aggressive cam than in Magnum stock engine. And I think that those were biggest modifications in engine, of course this Holley DP carb is also changed. But it is with magnum exhaust manifolds and with Flowtech mufflers.

It´s with 727 automatic and with 8 3/4" lock (3.23:1).

I don´t know how much it burns gas (everything??  ) and it does work good but I´ll go now and check one spark plug, make float adjustments and go driving  Let´s see how it works. Because adjustments should be right though even it works pretty well already. It might work even better after this I hope 

How it sounds?? Loud and mean machine 

[Brock Samson]

and it's on a stock Magnum intake?.. you might need to check all the plugs to check for carbon and or glazing etc... if your fiddeling around with adjustments whithout checking it won't help determine Rich Vs Lean issues...

[Charger´69]

and it's on a stock Magnum intake?.. you might need to check all the plugs to check for carbon and or glazing etc... if your fiddeling around with adjustments whithout checking it won't help determine Rich Vs Lean issues...

Yep, I´m going to buy wideband lambda and meter to it that I can always tune my engine myself  I had that kind of system (Innovate LC-1) in my ex Supercharged/injected Camaro and it was really great! 

Now adjustments is done and it come out AMAZING!  Now it idles much better and "lighter" and doesn´t stumble etc at all anymore  It also revs much cleaner and my "ass dyno" told me that there was now plenty more power also!!! 

What I did was:
- spark advance from 5 degrees before to 10 degrees before
- cold start adjustments
- float adjustments (it was almost right but too high, sight window was full of fuel. All I had to do was turn float adjustment screw only 1/4 turn clockwise and float level became right  And I checked it after driving that it was still right and it was!)

Now I´m satisfied to it, now it feels right!  Before it felt a little bit "heavy" when cruising 800-1200rpm but now it feels "lighter" and cleaner  So it turned out lighter, stronger, faster and it still starts immediately so these adjustments was really worth it 

Of course I´ll have to check air fuel ratio now because adjustments have been done, I´ll check those spark plugs at the end of this week when I first have driven it some kilometers  And maybe next week I´ll but that wideband lambda and meter to it so I can see always what kind of AFR there is 

Here is few questions still:
- What spark plugs would be good to this combination? I might change those to new ones at the same time when I check those spark plugs.
- How high I dear to rev this kind of 440cid Magnum engine? 5000rpm? 6000rpm? I´ve already revved it to little bit above 5000rpm and it really feels powerful there and it feels like it wants more rpms, I just don´t know how far is safe to rev it? 

[Charger´69]

Damn, when I thought again what I really did, I noticed that I turned float adjustment screw counterclockwise so it raises fuel level, so at the beginning the float level was too low!! It just looked that sight window was full of fuel but it was too low and I couldn´t see any fuel there at first! Now the float level is right and I can see fuel at the bottom of sight window 

Well, it did it what I had to do, I just did it wrong but it did go right, heh 

I just come to cruising with Charger, damn I love that car 

[Brock Samson]

you don't still want to paint that entire grill black do you?..   

[Charger´69]

you don't still want to paint that entire grill black do you?..   

HELL NO, I´m really sorry about my old fantasies 

This Charger is best like it is now, I haven´t even thought that kind of silly things anymore  And that is for sure also that I won´t change that ´68 grill to this, I´ve started to love that ´69 look  Of course I like that ´68 Charger also but... I have ´69 and love that look so I won´t change any ´68 parts to this 

[Brock Samson]

OK,..  i'll let you live... 

[Charger´69]

OK,..  i'll let you live... 

Thanks, I appreciate that 

[Charger´69]

Hmmm, how can I adjust my gas pedal cable??  Week ago we checked it and throttle doesn´t open 100% open at all, it opens maybe something 75% because of too long gas pedal cable. I assume there is some kind of adjustment too, I know that I can adjust that from carb but is it only place?

Because carb doesn´t open wide open, 727´s kickdown doesn´t work properly. And if I start accelerating and push gas pedal to the floor transmission shifts up before 3000 rpm. And of course there isn´t now all horsepower in use because carb´s opening is "limited"  I just wonder how it moves when that is adjusted properly 

[Charger´69]

Today I adjusted that carb cable right. It was loose so it had slipped towards carb so it couldn´t open carb wide open anymore. No it works and again, ass dyno said that there come more power  

I also adjusted those kickdown rods because kickdown didn´t work before and it always shifted up somewhere 2800 rpm even throttle was wide open. Now that also works   Now I don´t have to shift gears "manual" from shifter when I want to move my Charger faster  

I adjusted it that way, that kickdown rod goes all the way to other limit point when throttle is open, isn´t this the right way to do with 727??   Original adjustments just didn´t move enough, so I had to put one bolt to that rods long hole (in picture). I just wonder that is this always been that way loose that kickdown doesn´t work...   Eventhough it couldn´t be adjusted properly without that bolt that makes kickdown rod go a little bit far than before, because that kickdown rod was too short and it´s adjustments didn´t go far enough.

Now it works amazingly good, maybe I shouldn´t touch to it anymore, just drive, because now is everything just like should be  

... And I´m sorry, I burned rear tires a little bit today because it was so fun when everything worked like a clock   Hell yeah, great day with Charger again  

[charger2fast4u]

good to hear you got it dialed in pretty good. got a question about your engine before you got it running good. any chance when you would floor the car it would bog down for a quick second then take off like a rocket? my 440 runs pretty good except only problem is when you are cruising and then floor it it loses power then kicks back in and takes off. i checked fuel pressure and adjusted it didn't make a difference. still have the problem didn't try tuning the carb at all because didn't want to end up making it worse. i'm new to timing/ carb tuning

[Charger´69]

good to hear you got it dialed in pretty good. got a question about your engine before you got it running good. any chance when you would floor the car it would bog down for a quick second then take off like a rocket? my 440 runs pretty good except only problem is when you are cruising and then floor it it loses power then kicks back in and takes off. i checked fuel pressure and adjusted it didn't make a difference. still have the problem didn't try tuning the carb at all because didn't want to end up making it worse. i'm new to timing/ carb tuning

Yes it did sometimes that but not always. I would advice you to check first fuel float from carb and then if you have holley vacuum carb you might want to check that vacuum operated secondary tuning settings (look side 12 from manual that I linked here in first post). And I think it could be also wrong way working accelerator pump, if it gives you too much or too little amount of fuel when you floor it, this could be maybe the assumablest reason for that bogging 

I´m new to carb tuning also but I´ll try to learn all the time