Hi,

I was on the WPI FSAE team when I went there waayy back, and am currently on the UMass - Lowell team.

We ran a carburatored engine at FSAE VIR this past week. It was the single biggest factor against us in the design competition. It saved us cost and complexity, which was good since it is UMass, so no money, and we only had 10 weeks to fab the car.

We went out in the Enduro, but the carbs worked great. We had a slight ergonomic issue, causing the car to stall, and the carbs flooded on restart. We were still runnable, but the car got flagged off the track.

Funnily enough, when I was at WPI, I had wanted to pull the Haltech off the '96 car (the oldest and heaviest still there) and throw on carbs so we'd always have an easily tuned car ready for auto-x. The Haltech on the '96 was different than the other three cars there at the time, and was glitchy. That idea got shot down. I'm still not sure why though.

quote:

Originally posted by caho:
Just your thoughts...

Would one get massacred in design if they were to employ the use of a carb? If you can back it up with being simple, etc. and having a good reason for not going with FI?

I know they are crude and inefficient when compared to FI, but they also have their advantages.

Just think of the awesome venturi action you'd get if you put your metering ports IN the restrictor.