EFI

[68Chevele]

Last year I had a '79 malibu wagon pro touring car that belonged to a friend. I drove it to the Ohio show, 3,000 mile round trip, and then sold it to a coworker. A really nice car, but to the point, it had a FITech unit on it and if it were mine, it would have been in the trash and a nice Q-Jet in its place. Best I could get out of it with a 700R4 and 3.31 gears was 15 mpg, and I've had 21 mpg out of a similar combo with a Q-Jet. The engine is a 350/290 GM crate, and it ran well and cold starts were nice, but it soured me on add on FI units. They guy who bought it has a Sniper on his truck and loves it, but after 6 months for jacking around with this, is building a 650 vacuum Holley for it.

Did you ever take a look at the fuel and spark tables to see if you could lean it out on the cruise mode? or can you not do that on the FI Tech's? I know one thing on a Q-jet that gets mileage is to play with the APT makes a big difference in mileage.

 

[SSuperDave]

The unit was tuneable to a point. I didn't realize its limitations til Tom Rightler showed me the laptop that he uses on the Sniper in his General Lee Charger.
I had it leaned out to the point where it had a surge, then backed down a little. It also had an intermittent rolling idle that is still there. I think the FITech is a budget unit compared to some of the others. The instructions that came with it looked like they'd been translated from Norwegian to English by an illiterate Chinaman, the real advise came from the forum on their website.
I have a guy who does my Q-Jets for years now, just tell him your combo and specs and you get a perfect unit every time. I sent him one off a '75 Corvette a few years ago, picked up 3 mpg off a bone stock carb. When I got it, it would not turn a tire, that carb and a distirbutor recurve made it a new car.