Right now I've got an edlebrock carb with a manual choke and no choke cable inside the car. I've been thinking of getting a new carb with elecrtic (thermostat) choke but wanted to see if there was a high or low opinion of those, and if you've had good experiences with them, which brands did you have success with.
You can buy an electric choke kit from Edelbrock, it'd be cheaper then buying a new carb. I'm running a electric choke Edelbrock on my 66. It works great. I use the ignition switch to control a relay with power fed of a fused line off the battery. I wouldn't feed the choke off of any existing wiring because there's just too much resistance and voltage drop.
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Honestly, I hate electric chokes. I had one on my Holley and cursed it frequently. Especially if I was driving on a cold day (below 40*) on the highway, the electric choke couldn't stay warm enough to keep the choke from closing again.
It also cools down too fast, even on warm days when I stop the car for 5 minutes. No need for the choke to be on again but the electric choke closes again usually.
Why not just hook up a manual choke cable. Personally, I've always preferred manual chokes.
If my experience is any indication, the AVS Thunder series with a manual choke that came on one of my cars is not compatible with their electric choke kit. I ended up dropping a Holley Street Avenger 670 in it (with electric choke) and all is good!
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*67 Vintage Burgundy 390GTA with most of the bells and whistles*
I had the same experience as CobraSix with an electric choke on a Holley but my Edelbrock with the electric choke works just fine. I'd get a conversion kit.
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I like electric chokes, one less thing to fiddle with when getting your car going. Properly hooked up and adjusted they work fine for me. I like to adjust mine a tad "richer" (or closed) in the fall and back a tad leaner in the spring.
Edelbrock has the add on kits to add electric chokes to most of their carbs. I found my local OReilly's parts store had one in stock for my Edelbrock (along with some other Edelbrock service parts too.). I hook mine up with a simple single wire to the Stator post on the alternator just like Ford did on a few million cars and it's always worked fine for mine. I did have to replace the failed electric choke on SWMBO's car after 10 years of use. I wish more stuff would last 10 years. Currently I have two Edelbrocks in service.
When I was driving my 68 coupe all the time I had an edelbrock 1405 with manual choke cable. Adjusted it one time and was good from then on. Used to drive the car everyday and would pull the cable only in the morning to start it. Whole rest of the day didn't usually have to even worry about it unless it was really cold.
I also had very good results running an Edebrock carb with an electric choke. I just backed off the fast idle a little and it was PERFECT! No matter how cold it was, I would just tap the accelerator once, bump the starter and VAROOM!, my 351W would roar to life. The car would drive great as the choke opened slowly as the engine warmed up.
I had a '69 Cougar then which was my daily driver. I connected the choke to an extra lead on the fuse box that was on only when the key was on.
Honestly, I hate electric chokes. I had one on my Holley and cursed it frequently. Especially if I was driving on a cold day (below 40*) on the highway, the electric choke couldn't stay warm enough to keep the choke from closing again.
I had the same problems years ago with a car with an electric choke. Since then its been manual choke on all my carbs. Like someone else stated in the summer time I rarely need to use the choke to start the car. This applies to both my '68 Mustang and '69 Camaro.
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Manual Choke on Carb Questions?
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