I use a -10 line on my lean out. It's plumbed into the intake under the carb. I pull the lever on the 1/2" ball valve and it jumps up to around 3000 rpm. It heats up pretty quick.

On a cold day, I can get the car up to temp using roughly 1.5 gallons of fuel.

If I had an alky carb that burned 4 gallons of fuel to warm up an engine.......

I'd throw it thru the guys window who built it and rebuilt it.

Ed taught me that one...LOL

RE-DICulous....

And not for nuthin but you can easily drill and tap your intake while it's on the engine for a bigger fitting....

Rags and some grease and a vacuum....
Use tape to pick up any little bits you miss...

It's aluminum not steel.....and is not going to harm anything if you clean it up good.

When I ran alcohol....

I brought 4-5 gallon jugs of alcohol with me to every race plus 4 in the cars fuel cell

Warmed up on 3 different days at Lucas races and made probably 3 time runs and win a race....7 rounds.......Alky injection with just a primer....

So for 10 runs and 3 warm ups I used less than the 24 gallons I brought.....

I used an EGT to set idle temp and get it as hot as I could without stumbling with injection or a carb....

With injection base idle was 550-600+ degrees and with the shutoff pulled part way I could increase that a lot higher....and quickly build temp.

Primer Plus is a far better solution and I used one on my present car with a Terminator....

When I ran an Alky carb.....APD 1050


I used a 1/2" plastic line with a slide valve for a leanout and left it open continuously including before every run.....to keep temp up.

Lean the idle mixture screws as much as possible without getting into a stumble and you have to keep after that sometimes for weather swings...


If leaning your idle did nothing, I would not feel like that carb was calibrated right.....

Now I know who did the carb and they have a great reputation but this does not sound right....

Alcohol and a cold engine equals junk runs......

I don't know how you could burn 4 gallons of alky to warm up and not milk your oil....

I have seen people say a Primer Plus works fine with a carb.....A good option.....IMHO

This message has been edited. Last edited by: SCDIV1,

I've seen smaller 4150 carbs that would pull fuel from the main boosters at almost anything above idle. Make sure it's not pulling fuel from the mains. I have never run my water pump warming up with the lean out pulled. I let it get to 180-190, shut it off to heat soak, then warm it back up to temp after I cycle the water pump. Make sure your fuel pressure isn't too high, and floats levels aren't too high. 1/2" lean out should help, but there has got to be another issue to use 4 gallons.

SCDIV1 has it righ, to burn that much fuel is just wrong, period. So you either have a carb issue or your cooling system is way to big and you have to run the motor too long to warm it up,,, or a combo of the two.

Alky can run rich at idle without really running badly. First thing you need to do is make sure at idle with your lean out open and I don't care if its 3/8 or 1/2 or whatever, make sure no fuel is coming out of the booster! If it is, your float level is likely too high!
Next, turn in the idle mixture screws on the primary side until the motor starts to idle different... if you can turn those suckers in all the way with little to no impact to idle speed then your primary throttle plates are open too far which basically renders your mixtures screw useless! If this is the case then close the primary side and open the secondary side, if you have to open both to achieve a good idle speed but allow too much of the idle transfer slot to be exposed to manifold vacuum then you need to drill small holes in the throttle plates in order to close the enough to cover up most of transfer slots and still let enough air in to idle. (Call your carb guy!

Once this is good, adjust your idle screws.... if more/leaner is still needed then next would be your idle air bleeds.

Either way, the size of your lean out line is not the issue!

Your motor should idle nicely and gain water temp steady without the fan on when all is right.