just bought an 88 olds cutlass 305 and was wandering what a can do about all the wires stuffed under the hood
cleanin it up
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I got the same problem. Depends on what you are going to use the car for. If you have air ,cruise,etc. and going to keep it , I would try to rerout and hide stuff as much as possible and and use wire covers etc. to clean things up. I am not using mine as a daily driver or care about a/c and all that stuff,so its all getting ripped out and probably redo all the wiring to the bare minimum,like a race car.
like herald said depending what your building, for a show/luxury car i would keep everything, buy chrome wire covers, and all your other underhood chrome stuff, and keep it all there and re-routed, now most likely your not planning on building a race car with and olds 305, but your cheaper option is to cut some of the unecessary stuff out. on my car i did a sbc conversion, and I have a wire to the alt, the distributer, and the starter and the rest are either cut or tucked.
Just let the ugly flow. I gave up on even thinking about cleaning my car up under the hood because I like A/C, cruise, etc. Besides, the factory wiring is usually reliable if left as is, so I generally like to leave it as is, where is and how is. (I replicated everything GM did in a 305 car with mine when I swapped out the 231 V6, right down to the last little clip!)
carborater
thanks i might just leave it how it is. but my car feels like it might be losing power and my brother said i should look at carburetors, which one would be best for the 305 v8 sb. thanks
thanks i might just leave it how it is. but my car feels like it might be losing power and my brother said i should look at carburetors, which one would be best for the 305 v8 sb. thanks
Re: carborater
Unless the engine is modified, keep your original carburetor. If it does not have a computer running it, you can do no better for your 305 than the Quadrajet it already has. It's a 600cfm spread bore carb which builds fuel economy and low RPM throttle response compared to the Edelbrock 600. I have a 355 in my car, and I switched back from an Edelbrock 600 that was tuned properly to a Quadrajet and it runs much better with more fuel economy. Now, if it is running poorly, you may wish to have a carb shop rebuild it, and you probably also want new plugs, wires, cap and rotor. If you want to improve performance, dollar for dollar there is no substitute for better rear gears. The rear end gearing in these cars is not merely bad, it is amazingly bad! I would suggest a 3.23 axle ratio as you probably have a 2.41 or worse right now. After that I would look at the exhaust and go with a 3 in catalytic converter if that is a concern in your area. The engine you have, if stock, has 150hp. The exhaust is not designed to flow for much more than that. This is also why the car is so slow. It has less power than a base 4 cylinder Camry does today, and with worse gearing. Just remember that there are good reasons why most enthusiasts swap from a 305 to a bigger engine. The Chevy 305 is not the equal of a Ford 302, because it is a de-bored 350, while the 302 is a bored out 289. The 302 has a 4 in bore like a 350, which is vital on a 2 valve engine as it allows large enough valves to get good air flow. I have a 2.4 liter DOHC 4 in my pickup truck and it makes 143-155hp (depending on original application) with a bore that is smaller than a 305 (and the same stroke as a Chevy 400), but it has 4 valve heads, so it has both the flow it needs and the small bore is an advantage in this application to reduce NOX emissions and promote a fast burn. There's far more theory I could get into, but those are the basics.
classic_cut said:
Unless the engine is modified, keep your original carburetor. If it does not have a computer running it, you can do no better for your 305 than the Quadrajet it already has. It's a 600cfm spread bore carb which builds fuel economy and low RPM throttle response compared to the Edelbrock 600. I have a 355 in my car, and I switched back from an Edelbrock 600 that was tuned properly to a Quadrajet and it runs much better with more fuel economy. Now, if it is running poorly, you may wish to have a carb shop rebuild it, and you probably also want new plugs, wires, cap and rotor. If you want to improve performance, dollar for dollar there is no substitute for better rear gears. The rear end gearing in these cars is not merely bad, it is amazingly bad! I would suggest a 3.23 axle ratio as you probably have a 2.41 or worse right now. After that I would look at the exhaust and go with a 3 in catalytic converter if that is a concern in your area. The engine you have, if stock, has 150hp. The exhaust is not designed to flow for much more than that. This is also why the car is so slow. It has less power than a base 4 cylinder Camry does today, and with worse gearing. Just remember that there are good reasons why most enthusiasts swap from a 305 to a bigger engine. The Chevy 305 is not the equal of a Ford 302, because it is a de-bored 350, while the 302 is a bored out 289. The 302 has a 4 in bore like a 350, which is vital on a 2 valve engine as it allows large enough valves to get good air flow. I have a 2.4 liter DOHC 4 in my pickup truck and it makes 143-155hp (depending on original application) with a bore that is smaller than a 305 (and the same stroke as a Chevy 400), but it has 4 valve heads, so it has both the flow it needs and the small bore is an advantage in this application to reduce NOX emissions and promote a fast burn. There's far more theory I could get into, but those are the basics.
wow thanks, im not gonna change the carburetor, im gonna get exhaust sooner or later but i want to get headers also and i couldnt find any anywhere. thanks for the info about the carburetor you just stopped me from making huge mistake
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