carb troubles

[73-charger-383]

--I'm at a loss on where to go on my carb.

it's a weber afb competetion series (basically a edelbrock) 750 manual choke.  I'm just trying to get the car "right" again after sitting for a couple of years.  -it could be timing as well as carb problems i guess. 
  I rebuild the carb and was carefull to follow the instructions as close as i could (i couldn't get the jets out so i clean them as best as i could while still in the carb.  --after i put the carb back on, it's a ton closer to running right, but to keep it idling i have to feather my hand just right over the front half of the carb to keep it going.  As long as i keep my hand there, it will idle fine (but at a higher rmp than it should).....i tried adjusting the mixture screws on the front, but they have no noticeable effect on the way the car runs.  - i can turn either in all the way to where they seat, and it still won't kill the idle....where in the rebuild did i go wrong??  Do you think it's my floats set incorrectly, or is there some other part that i should be looking at?
  --the timing i have just set to get the most vacuum at idle, than backed it off untill the idle just drops.

thanks

[aifilaw]

We could go into adjusting floats, et cetera et cetera. But the rebuild should have covered that. if you are feathering your hand over it to keep the idle up then either your idle is inherently too low and prone to killing the engine, or you aren't dumping in enough fuel in the idle circuit. Open up the idle circuit screw more, or increase the jet. More than likely if it was running fine before, then they are simply clogged with debris or the idle circuit runner is partially obstructed. it is quite small, so an easy thing to happen. Basically if everything else is fine, then I would lean towards a lean idle condition.

[73-charger-383]

how do i go about cleaning the idle circuit runner??

when the floats hang down there's about an inch between the top of the float and the bottom of the gasket...(which is what the rebuild kit had said)--when i had originally took it apart, the floats sat quite a bit lower...i suppose i ended bending the tabs to bring the floats up almost 1/2".--i thought it seemed strange that they would be "out" that much, but figured i had best follow the instructions...

I'm out to pull it off again...
thanks for the reply...keep the ideas coming..

[73-charger-383]

still no luck....
anyone has any other ideas?

[dpixel]

I had more or less the same problem with my edelbrock 750 electric choke.  I pulled it apart and cleaned it up and two weeks later it was doing the same thing.  It seemed like only one of the barrels was the problem when I put my hand over it.  I ordered a new gasket/rebuild kit and cleaned it out again..(better this time).  It's been good for over a year now.  No adjustments on floats or jet changes.  My car was sitting a little while too.

It sounds like still more dirt in there to me, where the idle screws don't make much of a difference.  I turn my idle screws even and 1/8 turn and you can hear the difference.