I guess that my abillity to open the hood led me to believe that I was a SU mechanic. No so. It started by attempting to fix a problem of the choke control light staying on. I pulled the air cleaner, loosened the two screws on the choke control wires (so far so good) and fiddled around until things got of whack. I got a few miles of driving until black smoke started appearing from the exhaust pipe and it finally died, in my driveway thankfully. It will not start even after sitting over night. Flooding badly I guess. Is there a short term fix for this that will get me to a guy in a long robe with stars on it, a tall pointy hat and a magic wand to cast a get well spell on it? The car is a '72 with original carbs that have been recently tuned.

By the way, it was not a complete failure--the light stays off.

When you were fiddling, did you adjust any of the screws or knobs on the carbs? Also, are the choke cable screws tightened back down?

Move the choke cables through their full open/closed settings and make sure the nozzle underneath the carb moves down when the choke is open and up when closed.

Remove a couple plugs and see if they are really wet with gas too. If they are, remove all the plugs and let things air out for a while.

I have the same problem with my choke light staying on, Always. I haven't fixed it yet but I determined that the cable inside the black sheath was frozen and when I moved my choke lever nothing even happened. When I do get the light off from inside and hit a bump it comes right back on. I will replace my choke cable one of these days. I know this doesn't directly help you start your car but it might be worth checking your cable to see if the whole thing is frozen and cable needs to be replaced;that is, after Dumbledore fixes your car.

Maybe try this site..

http://www.jetlink.net/~okayfine/sutech.html

I pulled the plugs and they were all sooty, not wet. Cleaned them but it did not help. I was able to adjust the chokes and the car started but only ran for about 5 minutes. Then it died and did not restart. The plugs sooted up again. While it was running, the idle was very erratic. Shot up to about 3,500 and then down to nearly nothing before it died. It has plenty of fuel. The only screw I adjusted was the fast idle setting screw.

My car wont start at all. It floods imediatly. When I crank it over fuel drips excessively out of the carbs. I have a 71 with dual round tops. Did you ever figure out the problem?

Sounds like your floats are not adjusted correctly or the jets in the bowl lids are stuck open. Take off the float lids and check the jets to make sure they are free and not stuck.

I didn't see this when it came out, but I'll address it here:

The Choke Light Switch is NOT located in the engine bay.

The Choke Light Switch is located underneath your console, just forward of the lever. It is actually mounted to the bracket that the choke lever is attached to and swivels on. The switch is a normally closed, momentary open type of switch. That is, it doesn't make contact and close the circuit until you release it's button because the lever keeps it open. When you pull on the lever, it releases the switch, just like your brake switch, and allows it to close.

If your Choke light is staying on, there are two possibilities:

One, the switch bracket has been bent back, such that the choke lever now cannot push the switch to the off position.

Two, you adjusted the choke cables such that when you have them all the way OFF, i.e. the cable has been pushed to the NON choked position, the lever is too far back to push the switch to it's off position.

Both of these remedies involve getting underneath the center console and looking at the choke lever assembly.

Enrique

On the issue of fuel pouring out of the carbs.

Does the car have an electric fuel pump?

I'm not a grease monkey, I do electrical and body work, but to my untrained mind that is what jumped out as a possibility to me.

2¢

:classic: I f you have fuel running out the carbs . First check the float , and the float level in the float bowl. have you been doing anything with the fuel pump , or the carbs ? Are you running fuel filters ? If no filters get some . If y ou have been doing anything with the fuel lines or pump you might have dislodged stuff that has stuck in the fuel shutoffs in the carb . Just a possability. :classic: Gary

Zwolly , if you have "adjusted" the adjustment that in under the carb that rises up and down when you cycle he choke, then you have messed with the mixture adjustment and most likely have it all out of wack. If you havent touched them then leave them alone. If you have turned them in fiddleing with things then try this. reach under and turnthe adjustment knobs counter clockwise untill the stop, then back down by turning clock wise 21/4 turns then try to start the car . It should start unless there is some thing else wrong. :classic:

Mann you guys are friggin awesome!

I love this web site! I'm going to go and try to start it back up. I've been working on my engine at school all day. Grinding valve seats is fun.

My high school auto shop is building about 10 chevrolet 350's. It's quite a site to see all the students working on engines the way we do. We are going to start them up some time next week. There are a few with some pretty good parts like 11:1 pistons, Schnider cams (you should see the lobes!), forged cranks. Alot of our parts are from ex race motors. Lots of fun in that class.