I don't believe in "jinxes" but I'm close. I haven't posted lately but I'll start at the beginning. In 2010 I attempted to change my M38 from a hybrid-ed, bubba'd half 12V, half 24V system to straight 24V. At the time the Jeep ran pretty well;started well, ran well, had plenty of pep. I collected up all the parts--distributor, wires, plugs, new coil, condenser, points and had a mechanic at a local garage who knows(?) older systems change it all over to totally 24V. After all, the generator, regulator, starter, lights--all that was 24V so it was cheaper to simply put it back to original. The objective was to stop the burning up of points and condensers that it was doing about every 3 months where it would become hard to start, would skip and sputter and not run nearly as well as it had originally---even with the f-ed up bubba system it had. It never ran right from that day forward. For one thing, I notice that the distributor is ONE "cog" off; the engine would have to be partially disassembled to fix that. I can partially compensate by turning the distrib. "so far" but it hits against the air cleaner and sits "cockeyed" rather than parallel to the engine like it should as shown in the diagrams and pics. It is
almost timed right, but is off j-u-u-u-s-t a smidgeon. It never ran "right" again. The old 12V distributor, being round, doesn't "hit" against whereas the 24V one is oblong and the "tail" hits against the air cleaner. It was determined(?) by a mechanic that we had a carburetor problem. We replaced 4 Solex carbs and did 3 rebuilds and got the same results: hard starting, sluggish running---IF it started at all------and at one point it would hardly pull its own weight! I began to suspect that the mechanic did not
know what he was doing. He kept insisting it was the carburetor...BUT! What are the chances that 4 carbs would be BAD in a row? And then another fellow bought a CJ3B with the F 134 that had the SAME carburetor from the SAME dealer that I did. He installed the carb and away he went with NO issues! So I'm saying, "Hmmmm", If it is a "bad" carburetor, in my case, HOW can it be that MINE is the only one that got 4 in a row. IOW, what are the odds? Honestly, I don't believe it is the carburetor. 4 in a row, c'mon!
I took it to another shop who got it running. I thought I was good to go for another $200 in addition to the $700 I had spent on the conversion. I took it to ONE car show----and it started doing the SAME ****
It would crank right up, but the more it ran, the worse it became, losing power, refusing to take the gas until it would stall. Then not start at all! Now its back at that shop----but THAT mechanic hasn't shown back up since. So I am pretty PO'ed at him, too. He promised he'd be back last Monday, but didn't show, and I have an event Saturday!
For a further description of how it acts (not saying that's it), it runs like (if it starts at all) like the choke was left ON. It started, ran, then as it warmed up, it got worse and worse. Like the choke was "stuck". The linkage works. But on my Solex I can't SEE a choke butterfly. Most chokes are located just inside the carb body right where the linkage enters the carburetor. But I can't SEE where the butterfly IS, or that that is any connection to an internal choke mechanism
I can SEE the throttle butterfly down in the bottom of the carb, but WHERE is the choke mechanism
ONE common denominator could be the change over to 24V and I am almost considering putting it back ALL 12V. I hate to, but, if I can't get it to run right, what can I do? Other people get theirs to run right.
SO does anyone have any insight into this mess OR are there any local mechanics (Charlotte, Hickory, Shelby NC area) that could help me with this. The Jeep has been "down" for a year now?! HELP!
FJ
