Reply to "weber intake"

Many people have removed the center post. It's your car. It's your choice.

To call the post a mistake is not the facts.


The manifold was intended for a Pantera race car application. Using the center pedestal for the bellcrank enables the stock throttle cable to be retained in the stock location. You have to use the Ford distributor and the cable clears under it and between the manifold. It is very, very close there though. Other distributors will have a larger housing and the cable will not fit through there.

There is a trick to using the Pantera throttle cable and making the center post work though. You need to remove the internal steel tube sleeve under the spring in the throttle cable assembly to make it flexible enough to snake it through. If you do not, the tube, which is rigid steel tubing, will kink because it is not flexible and the throttle will hang up constantly. You will be blaming the carb linkage for that which it is not the cause of the problem.

For the throttle cable, the mounting points from the front of the manifold to the attachment to the center bellcrank are not a straight line. It is close but off just enough to kink the internal steel tube in the throttle cable assembly.

This modification removes any kind on binding that the stock throttle cable is inherent to develop when bent even slightly. This modification to it makes a nice light throttle feel even though you have all of those throttle return springs (four carbs) plus the linkage return springs. It works with using a single 4v carb also.

In addition to keeping the throttle cable down the center of the engine, it creates more room for plumbing and wiring or whatever the race car required. It unclutters the top of the engine.



Some people like to go to a side mount bell-crank which is going to mount over the driver side valve cover. On a race car, that impedes access to the valve cover and to the valve train, i.e., clutters the engine more needlessly.

If it matters, I have run it both ways and the center post, when you have the linkage to it right is by far a better way in a Pantera. A Mustang, the side linkage is better.

The over under linkage works only one way in this setup though. Many people just can't get that to work properly.

Been there done that. I can understand that frustration. Weber linkage is not the simplest thing to get to work right. It looks simple. but it isn't at all.



The other thing people like to do is change the orientation of the carbs by installing a spacer plate under the right side carbs and a spacer/reverser plate under the left side carbs.

Usually it is because that makes the linkage easier for them to center with a side mount bellcrank.

There is an issue with that change though. If you notice in the original configuration the tips of the throttle plates open in line of sight to the intake valve. That's not a mistake. That's how the manifold was designed to work.

If you reverse those two carbs, they open on the wrong side of those intake ports away from the valve. The result is there is a loss of throttle response off of idle and a noticeable loss of power through the engines power range.

It's something like a 50 ft-lb loss of torque right off of idle.


There is no right and wrong really. There are choices that one makes in order to apply these carbs as best they can. All solutions will likely have some sort of an issue. You want to use the solution with the least amount of issues or compromises.

The IDA's in some senses are fragile carbs. You want to load the throttle shafts as lightly as possible with the linkage. The throttle shafts in the carbs are thin and twist very, very easily. Many people develope problems from that they didn't even realize. This happens most often by overloading the throttles with too much twisting stresses from way too much return spring pressure caused by the need to return the throttles to closed because the linkage isn't right.

When the linkage is right, the throttle on this setup is like stepping on a sponge. You can hardly feel it at all.

I think the "factory" considered all of this in the layout of the carbs and the manifold. Theirs has much less compromise.



I'm going with their knowledge, expertise and experience on all of this. I have no desire to attempt to reinvent the wheel. That's already been done. Roll with it.

To say that the designers on the manifold made a mistake by putting in the pedestal though is just not an accurate statement.

They were not stupid. They knew exactly what they were doing and certainly had more then one reason for it.

When you experience the throttle working correctly as a result of the center post linkage, it will be an epiphany.