Carburetor icing?

roccaas

roccaas

Well-known member
I enjoyed a replay of Click & Clack on XM last week, and the guys diagnosed Carb icing on a lady's '84 Accord. They recommended a check of the thermal switch and the warm air stove off of the exhaust manifold.

This took 10 minutes and much hilarity.

I've never heard of a Zenith or Tilly icing. Is an updraft carb nestled in an exhaust manifold less prone to icing?
 
roccaas,

Never heard of carburetor icing in a Model A, by definition, of course if there is water in your fuel it will freeze.

This photo was taken 1-31-13 at about 10 F above zero, runs good at this temperature.

Be sure to keep the carburetor out of the snow.

Darryl in Fairbanks
 

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Kind of off topic, but maybe someone here will find it interesting: If the carburetor and intake manifold is separated from the exhaust manifold by much distance for some reason (like a Pietenpol aircraft engine conversion) the A engine becomes a carburetor ice monster. For this reason most Ford powered Pietenpols draw their intake air from a heat muff around the #4 exhaust stack. Without this little bit of heat, icing is a real problem and the engine becomes prone to loss of power and can quit without warning, none of which is a good thing in an airplane... Below is a pic of a friends Piet engine being ground tested before installation of the heat muff. At the time the picture was taken, the temperature was about 50 deg F, and the humidity was about 75%. Perfect conditions for icing, and the engine was more than a little cranky about it. It refused to idle at all, and didn't make the power it should.

image.jpeg
 
A buddy of mine has told me back in the 70s him and all his buddies with As decided to put downdraft carbs on. Shortly after they all had problems with icing and were making up some crazy rigs to get heat around the carb.
 
Upside down?? Not this boy!! Gravity is your friend with an A! (gotta keep oil in the dipper tray somehow!!) Mr. Pietenpol wrote that the A carb was fine in the air as long as you kept it warm, but it tended to load up and run poorly when bouncing along on the ground (as most A drivers with good brakes know). Today most Piet guys use the B carb or the Tillotson. The one in the pic is a B...
 
bphillips,

I am certainly glad that you posted your reply regarding carburetor icing.

Here in interior Alaska, at least on the ground, in the winter, we approach near zero humidity. This unusual condition here in Fairbanks allows us to be able to run most of the the time without having to consider icing conditions. Not necessarily so for the rest of the world.

Here in the valley we kind of get stuck in our own little world.

Thanks again.

Darryl in Fairbanks
 
Thats a nice pic of frost on the intake. I think the reason our little Fords don't have carb ice issues is due to the way the manifolds are situated [bolted together] and how close the carb inlet is to the exhaust.
 
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