Weber or Solex

[Joe Wright]

Hi everyone,
My 316 (1.8 engine) is fitted with a Weber carb and manual choke. Great I thought. I had always seen Weber carbs as very good quality and I was under the impression it was a better set up to have than the original Solex. Then I read the Practical Classics article on this forums buyers guide. It say's too change a Weber conversion back to Solex as it's almost impossible to get a Weber running properly on an E21. What does everyone else think?
Cheers
Joe

[Peter V.]

I have a weber on my M20B20 an it runs perfectly.

Often the solex carbs are the one that give problems. Ofcourse a perfect restored solex runs good also.

[Joe Wright]

Thanks for that

[Alibaba]

My 32/34 DTML on my '83 316 1800cc certainly runs better than the factory fitted carb, which I'm pretty certain was a Pierburg. Better performance and better mpg and I found the auto choke on the factory carb an absolute pain.

The swap to Weber is dead easy with the Webcon kit and a return to original spec is easily possible, but the throttle cable would need to be replaced as the cable nipple is cut off to connect it with the Weber.

My only criticism of the Weber is the profile of the throttle cam which tends to make the carb very sensitive to small changes in throttle openings at lowish revs.

My recent trip around Europe gave me 35-40mpg driven conservatively. And I now have the beauty of a manual choke!

Having done a lot of homework before doing the change, the general opinion appeared to be that the Weber would be a better bet and I have a feeling that this mod was approved by BMW.

Good luck!

[Joe Wright]

Thats great, thanks for that. I haven't had many problems with it and like you say I much prefer having a manual choke although I hardly need to use it. Think it's probably best to have it tuned professionally as im not sure it is set up correctly at the moment. I was just confused by this particular article I read and wanted to see what people thought. Thanks for that.
Joe

[Alibaba]

I don't think there's much to tune on the Weber if the factory blanking plugs are still in place.

Facing the radiator on the foot of the carb on the passenger side is the idle mixture screw which is recessed within the casting. Screwing it clockwise with a small screwdriver weakens the mixture and anti-clockwise richens the mixture.

Get the car properly hot and adjust the screw for maximum tickover revs, then re-adjust the throttle stop screw for about 850rpm.

[Joe Wright]

Thanks mate, ill give it a go