4.3 W engine to a regular 4 barrel carburetor
 

Has anyone ever changed a 4.3 W engine to a regular 4 barrel carburetor and intake? Did you run into any difficult problems? My father had a 85 Chevy full size pickup that a 4.3 that came with a 4 barrel carburetor, it did pretty good.

You would also have to change out the distributor too, right? Does anyone know what power and gas mileage would be like?

Your gas milage would probably suck going from injected to carbed. I wouldn't do it personaly but to each their own. I'm not sure about changing the distributor. I would assume yes. Power you might get a little more IF you dial in the carb just right but that's a BIG MIGHT. Here again I wouldn't give up the vortec but that's me.

edlebrock has intake and head kits for carbed 4.3 i hear you get some nice power gains but you loose mileage

yeah Edlebrock has a couple of intakes for the 4-3, and you don't need to swap heads. although you will maximize any power gains by using their heads.

but as said above, why the hell would you want to get rid of FI? unless you're planing on dropping it in a non-FI vehicle?

This was mentioned under another topic on this board, just wonder if anyone had done it, what results they had.

My 1st car was a 57 Chevy, 283 power pack, it had power, 220 HP, good gas mileage, 21 on the highway if you kept your foot out of the Rochester Quadra-Jet 4 barrel and stayed 70 MPH or below. My 92 S10 Blazer gets 22 to 23. I might add in 57 the 283 power pack would get better mileage on the highway than the 283 that came with the 2 barrel carburetors.

One advantage would be much easier to work on and would not have near as much that could go wrong with it, not having the computer and sensors, of course in states that do the smog test it would be a no no.

Well the nice thing about the computers (obd II atleast) you plug up a computer and can narrow down what's going on imediatly. Like I said I would never pull fuel injection to go to a carbed set up. I'm partial to the fuel injection and the way you can narrow down things a lot faster with the computers. But here again to each their own. Your truck you do what you will with it man. Now on another note an ex of mine had a 1st gen non vortec and he did this. In his situation we couldn't get the throttle body set up to run right so we just ripped it all out and put the eldebrock manifold and carb in and it ran beautifully after that. But that was 6 years ago so I don't really remember much about it.

I'm pretty happy with my vin Z engine. I get the best of both worlds: lack of complication of a carburetor, not *too* many computers so it's not impossible to fix stuff when it breaks, and there's about 80 bazillion of the same model with the same engine and body style in my local salvage yard. It's a shade tree mechanic's paradise.

Yes, the obd II gives you much more information on where to look while the obd 1 doesn't.


As for carburetors, they're not that difficult. 1 generations Blazers are a thing of the past in ths country in the wrecking yards, they've all been crushed. In fact wrecking yards around this part of the country hardly keeps anything older than a 2000.

since you never included your location in your posting info (upper right hand corner), i've gotta ask, where are you from?

I can't find 2nd gens down here in GA. But a lot of people part em out on CL they just don't go to wrecking uards very often. I'm not a big junkyard fan personaly unless your going for body panels or something you can't buy aftermarket.

Southwest Arkansas.

The crushing of cars and trucks is one of the worse things that's happened to shade tree mechanics. They can make quicker money crushing them than they can waiting on people come to buy parts.

And of course circle dirt tracks have gotten rid of many models of cars.

Converting to carb is a bigger pain than it looks. What about everything the computer is wired to that it controls like the instrument cluster? The transmission is electronically controlled, how do you plan on fixing that if you dump the ECU? It's just not worth it, you can just get an ECU tune from a professional tuner for a few hundred dollars and see much bigger gains that you would from converting to carb for the same price, and to see the same gains as a 4.3 even in stock tune, you'll need to get the exact right carb and tune it perfectly, it's not worth it at all.

Keep it EFI and get a tune, you'll bump up power and mileage tremendously and it's much easier and quicker, and to top it off will have better driveability in every weather.

Oh me, lets see, I've had several cars and trucks ranging from a 57 Chevy to a 85 Blazer that had carburetors and had no drivability with any of them. Besides that, many of the older Blazers are not even worth the several hundred dollars you speak of.

I come across this post in another forum, it seems he changed his over to a carburetor.

I didn't say with a carb it won't be driveable on the street, but modded EFI has better driveability on the street in most cases. I had a Silverado with a 4bbl Edelbrock, ran terrible because I found out the last guy put a 600CFM carb on a 250 flywheel hp motor, I put a 500CFM carb on and it ran much better. Edelbrock Performer carbs are made to run smooth on the street out of the box but it's still not as smooth as any of the tuned EFI cars i've driven like my old 5.0 Mustang.

will a 96 blazer engine fit into a 99 blazer

I put a carb on a 1996 4.3 s10 pickup ext.cba.It wasnt that bad.I had the computer fixed buy local guy.$125.00.I also put in a cam and lifters.dual exhaust and headers.I had to change the dist.Only because I need more fire for the engine.It would take off.I had some money into it.Stuff isnt cheap.LCM has what you need to swop it out.The intake and Holley carb.They also have the cam.I wrecked it about 6 months ago.A great little toy.im not sure,But I think thry might have a TBi upgrade for the 4.3.Im not sure,but think they do.