1981 Carb.

[David H.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

... p.s. The wrong carb should not be nearly enough to prevent the car from a Top Flight, should it? ... Brad Hillhouse 37766

Brad,

OP indicated he lost 55 points (29/26 points - total deduction) in judging. That alone would not prevent a Top Flight. Might have been the straw that ...

We'll discuss next time I see you.

Dave

[Jeff G.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

Hi Brad,
Thanks for the interest.


The suffix code is ZDD.
Auto trans
non Cali

[Jeff G.]

[Jeff G.]

[Terry M.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

The wrong carb will prevent me from reaching Top Flight. The car works too good to make that step right now.
Any guidance would be appreciated.

The deduction for the carburetor by itself will not keep you from reaching Top Flight, nor will it keep you from 97%. If you didn't reach Top Flight look at your other issues and make the changes that are most cost effective.

[Patrick H.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

The deduction for the carburetor by itself will not keep you from reaching Top Flight, nor will it keep you from 97%. If you didn't reach Top Flight look at your other issues and make the changes that are most cost effective.

I don't think it should have received a total deduction either.
CDCIF
20% for configuration (i.e. part number), but it's got the rest of the DCIF.

Could the manual be incorrect? Absolutely.

[Tom R.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

Could the manual be incorrect? Absolutely.

The 1973-74 revision team found numerous inconsistencies between parts book and the applications on original cars.

Also, the 3rd edition of the 80-81 manual was void of a collaborative process that teases out these exceptions and therefore noted in the revision. The revision was recent and there is already known issues. Too often judges view the process of judging as a series of absolutes! Yet, its known that there exist deviations to known TIMJG production changes (and not always known) that require a nuanced approach to the judging process.

Was this a regional or chapter event?

[Tom R.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

I found some interesting information about the 81 carbs available.
The MVMA Specification Form (page 8) only shows 2 possible Carburetors. 17081217 for manual trans and 17081218 for auto trans.
The NCRS manual has a 3rd listed as 17081228 which GM does not list. Could the manual be incorrect?
It would explain my car. It would make more sense because there doesn’t seem to be any performance difference between the Cali cars and others. FYI there were only 4951 California cars out of over 40,000 built according to the Black Book.

This is the type of information that should be used to reconcile production deviations during the revision process. Your issue is an excellent example of a production deviation that should be researched and published in the Corvette Restorer as an article. You mentioned above that you knew one other example. Why not research this topic and publish your findings. You have the MVMA documents to support your theory and two examples (non-CE vehicles with CE carbs) to support your thesis. If the other owner has a buildsheet, you now have a third piece of evidence to support your theory and therefore the installation of CE carbs on non-CE vehicles.

[David H.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

Edward. I don’t think I can get a broadcast sheet as this is a St Louis car. Do you know of a source?

Jeff,

A vehicle INVOICE is available for your car from GM Archives. (1977 and forward Corvette) This invoice, also known as a "Shipper" document, contains dealer name and address, Regular Production Option (RPO) information, V.I.N., Production Date, etc specific to your car.

http://www.gmmediaarchive.com/?page=1

Dave

--------------

Non specific V.I.N., i.e. general model year dealer information, is also found on this GM Archive site - downloadable as a pdf.

1953-2006 Corvette Vehicle Information Kits at:

https://www.gmheritagecenter.com/gm-heritage-archive/vehicle-information-kits.html

[Terry M.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

I don't think it should have received a total deduction either.
CDCIF
20% for configuration (i.e. part number), but it's got the rest of the DCIF.

Could the manual be incorrect? Absolutely.

I would actually be easier than that given most of the configuration is is TFP and only the numbers (and presumably internal parts which we can not assess) are different. I might have done 10%, or maybe one or two points. However, I didn't want to get into criticizing the judges with their feet on the ground. I simply wanted to point out that there are 4500 points to the judging process.

Tom has made some valid points below as well. Those are well worth considering also.

[Jeff G.]

[Tom R.]

Re: 1981 Carb.

I’ve been working through all the issues that had deductions. There were small deductions throughout the car. The carb deduction at 55 points drew my attention because of its size so I began working on that item. BTW-That alone would not have achieved Top Flight for me so this isn’t a sour grapes thing. The more I’ve been looking into this, the more I think this is the original Carb.

As it should be and I wouldn't change it under any circumstances. I mean why would someone change out a federal emission carb for a California emission carb...which I suspect are not plentiful in the first place. It would be interesting to find out how many Corvettes were built and delivered to California from St Louis in the 1981 production year.

Ill be polling the folks on the 81 Corvette Facebook page to see which Carburetor they have on their cars. If you happen to know anyone with an 81, please ask them to forward their info to me. I’ll let you know what I find.

Please don’t criticize the judges from my Chapter.

A better place would be the Corvette Forum to survey 81 owners.

We all understand that, and especially at chapter meets, C2, C3 judges are called up to judge C4s, C5s and vice versa. Therefore, their single source of reference is that manual. At the same time, an owner should be cautious about going off the deep end and raise the question and especially, in their own mine, they recognize originality.

[Jeff G.]