Hello - researching for possible efi to stubaker six.

[chicodave]

To be honest, I have always been a carb person, I like things simple. But my wife and sons like to drive the underpowered 1950 studebaker truck with a 170 flat head six. I was thinking the conversion to TBI would make it a tad easer for the novice to drive, might add a pony or two. Sure would be a conversation piece. The hardware side of the swap seems easy enough, but the custom tuning makes me a bit unsure. The truck has been change to 12v from 6v. I may not get past the dreamer stage of this, but I sure have enjoyed reading other posts.

-Dave
Chico Tx

[EagleMark]

:welcome2:

Not to mention the coolest guy on the block...

:welcome:

[1project2many]

Howdy.

This sounds like a neat conversion. If you go through with it, please post pictures and updates.


As far as electronics, one of the great benefits of using the electronic control is the ability to get the timing dialed in very well. Using the computer to control timing alone and leaving the fuel to the carb will usually result in noticeable driveability improvements.

[Fast355]

To be honest, I have always been a carb person, I like things simple. But my wife and sons like to drive the underpowered 1950 studebaker truck with a 170 flat head six. I was thinking the conversion to TBI would make it a tad easer for the novice to drive, might add a pony or two. Sure would be a conversation piece. The hardware side of the swap seems easy enough, but the custom tuning makes me a bit unsure. The truck has been change to 12v from 6v. I may not get past the dreamer stage of this, but I sure have enjoyed reading other posts.

-Dave
Chico Tx

Welcome! Saw your location on here. Growing up I spent my summers at the parents lakehouse on the river end of bridgeport off 1810 and county line road and learned to drive on those lightly traveled country gravel roads.

Are you considering controlling the timing with the ECM too or just the fuel?

Chris

[steveo]

when it comes down to it, you can just roughly tune it like a carb you've just installed on a new engine. you just have tables instead of jets, and tables instead of distributor weights and vac advance units. you know, start a bit on the rich and retarded side just to make it driveable, then fine tune it.

but im sure someone with more experience could help you (for minimal $$$) to make a good 'starter bin' that at least gets it running and idling, and you can tweak it from there, making it a good learning experience instead of a frustrating 'oh crap it's undriveable till i master EFI' experience.

[chicodave]

Welcome! Saw your location on here. Growing up I spent my summers at the parents lakehouse on the river end of bridgeport off 1810 and county line road and learned to drive on those lightly traveled country gravel roads.

Are you considering controlling the timing with the ECM too or just the fuel?

Chris

Chris
I would like to modify the distributor using and HEI like the fella on this board is doing with the Internationals. Seems like an easy improvement to do.

-Dave

[chicodave]

Yep Bridgeport is just 12 miles away from me. You would be surprised, must of the dirt road have been paved. ;)

[chicodave]

when it comes down to it, you can just roughly tune it like a carb you've just installed on a new engine. you just have tables instead of jets, and tables instead of distributor weights and vac advance units. you know, start a bit on the rich and retarded side just to make it driveable, then fine tune it.

but im sure someone with more experience could help you (for minimal $$$) to make a good 'starter bin' that at least gets it running and idling, and you can tweak it from there, making it a good learning experience instead of a frustrating 'oh crap it's undriveable till i master EFI' experience.

Sounds like good logic in the process. Thanks

[Fast355]

Yep Bridgeport is just 12 miles away from me. You would be surprised, must of the dirt road have been paved. ;)

Where we go is still alot of gravel, but some road improvments have been made lately. We are up on the river end of the lake, between Chico and Jacksboro off 1810.

I agree with you on the distributor. Timing control is half the value of EFI. By being able to accurately control the timing at all RPM, Load, and temperatures you get better driveability. Also you are not relying on mechanical devices that have a tendency to wear and become unreliable.

If you need I can give you a hand with the tuning side when you get the hardware setup.

Are you planning to run a 2bbl TBI on it? For the HP the 170 I6 likely makes you would probably do well with a 2.8 TBI unit from a S10 or S10 Blazer. The Chevy 2.8 ~ 173 cid made about 125 HP.

[steveo]

there is no reason not to get spark control. just add an icm to feed the coil and it's done? we're talking a few more wires

there are also things that fail to work as expected without spark control.

power enrichment likes special spark trim since it's dumping more fuel. dfco in some ecms uses spark blending to get smoothness. IAC control is sometimes coupled with timing to attempt to fix smaller idle speed errors, and idle logic is touchy.

[chicodave]

Where we go is still alot of gravel, but some road improvments have been made lately. We are up on the river end of the lake, between Chico and Jacksboro off 1810.

I agree with you on the distributor. Timing control is half the value of EFI. By being able to accurately control the timing at all RPM, Load, and temperatures you get better driveability. Also you are not relying on mechanical devices that have a tendency to wear and become unreliable.

If you need I can give you a hand with the tuning side when you get the hardware setup.

Are you planning to run a 2bbl TBI on it? For the HP the 170 I6 likely makes you would probably do well with a 2.8 TBI unit from a S10 or S10 Blazer. The Chevy 2.8 ~ 173 cid made about 125 HP.



Spark control and S10 2.8v6 donor. Lots of S10's in the junk yard. :) Thank for the info.

[chicodave]

I wonder if a 2.5L 1V TBI would be a simpler choice. Also to control the 1bl tbi would a 1227747 work or is the computer that came on the S10 2.5L be a better choice?

Thanks

-Dave