Looking for carb choke parts // or just replace the whole thing?

ptc075

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Howdy all. Already spoken to a few of you via PM. TY for all your help! For those of you who I haven't met here, I'm slowly restoring a '69 Town & Country that's been in the back of dad's garage for a "long time". I get down to see him about 4x a year, and every time I go I make a bit of progress on the car. Car will never be a show car, but it's got a 440 in it and the rust isn't bad (southern car), so I'm looking forward to getting it moving well enough to trailer it home. Last trip, the car managed to start & idle under it's own power, which is a huge huge step. So getting pretty excited here. But enough background, let me jump to my question.

I recently rebuilt the carb, and it seems to be okay (just). Once the car gets hot, it's able to hold idle and pump its own gas (nice!). But until it gets hot I have to fiddle with the choke linkage manually and use a heavy hand of starter fluid.

So now I'm looking at the choke. Er, chokes, as there appear to be TWO of them?!? The first appears to be a "vacuum choke", and the other is a "choke thermostat" (a bi-metalic coil of wire). I'm unable to find either of those at the usual parts stores. Could someone suggest a place to buy good replacements?

Before I even go that route though, is it even worth it to hunt for these parts? Should I just slap an Edelbrock on it & call it done? Shooting from memory, carb is a Carter AVS-4966, which seems like a nice enough 4BL, at least to my novice eyes anyway. Conversely, I don't need to keep it factory for my purposes (going to be a Sunday sundae getter). I'm no carb wizard, so whatever is going to be 'more' reliable is the direction I need to go.
 
Someone may have swapped the cab out, that number looks to be a 71.
Was this originally a 4bbl car? a 69 would have either a 4640 or 4618

Probably doesn't matter, I'd replace the choke as a unit (complete) as well as the choke pull off (diaphragm) if needed.

Alan
 
The "vacuum choke" is the choke pull off, those are available on e-bay. Vacuum pull off opens the choke part way once the engine starts so that the vehicle does not flood out. The spring mechanism in the intake is known as a "Divorced choke thermostat." Those are also available on e-bay, but you need to match the unit to the year and displacement of the engine. There are a couple of carb parts vendors on this site that probably have the parts you need. You can check the choke pull off with a short length of vacuum hose to see if it will hold vacuum. If it holds vacuum, it should still work assuming that it is properly hooked up. The proper operation of the choke thermostat requires that the vehicle heat riser is functioning properly to direct exhaust gasses thru the heat riser passage under the carb. If the heat riser is stuck open, the choke will not open.

Dave
 
First thing is to determine why the choke mechanism is having issues. Is the vacuum choke pull-ff not working (leaking)? Or is the main thermostat too tight? Or combination thereof.

It has been observed that the choke thermostatic spring will tighten with age. Which means they act "too rich" and need to be adjusted leaner about one notch. No need to get a new one. Just re-adjust it so that the choke plate just closes at ambient 70 degrees F (air around the carb/engine and the carb/engine itself). When the engine fires and starts, then the vacuum pull-off will pull the plate open a bit so the engine will continue to run and warm-up (as the choke thermostat should relax during that process, until it is vertical in the housing).

By observation, if the existing carb is actually calibrated for a model year or two later, that would not be a really big deal, just that it is probably a slight bit leaner to meet the later emissions regulations. Not a significant issue in the engine running and operating decently well, to me. But do verify the carb number next time you are down there.

The ultimate fix would be a new Edelbrock AVS or AFB variant with an electric choke. It's not that hard to wire power to the electric choke thermostat, but it is necessary. Yet, from my experiences, getting THAT electric choke can take some tweaking for everything to work correctly. Trading one set of issues for another set of issues, except the new issues would be on a completely new carb. FWIW

Great that you want to save the vehicle and get it operational again! Please keep us posted on your progress.

Enjoy!
CBODY67
 
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