The Zenith Carburetor....
Just what does it take to restore a Zenith Carburetor? Many just clean them up check the jets new gaskets and paint and it's ready to go.
I believe there needs to be much more care involved.
Careful complete disassembly of the entire carburetor. This includes every plug port jet...... all of it. Each port should be inspected bead blasted cleaned inside and out. All parts should be checked for correct dimensions and inspected for wear. Any component out of tolerance either repaired or replaced. All casting plugs then reinstalled. A list of needed repair parts generated and ordered for later reassembly. When all needed parts have arrived only then should the reassembly begin.
After reassembly a complete visual inspection is performed for any possible problems that might have been overlooked.
Now it's time for calibration. All jets need inspection for proper size and flow.
Now with all of the previous items completed then it has been properly restored and is ready for the official approval to go into the good box.
Restoring for Vintage Accuracy
It is difficult at times to completely restore a Zenith carburetor for authentically correct assembly due to the availability of needed vintage correct components. Steel versus brass components and cadmium plated parts. Rebuilders over the years have mixed component parts from Zenith Zenith1 and Zenith2 carburetors and for that matter parts from different manufacturers Zenith, Ford and Holly. All parts are manufactured as to be interchangeable. So when the rebuilders reached in to the casting bin it could be any combination of manufactures upper or lower castings.
Over the years many castings have been damaged by the use of incorrect taps when cleaning the castings. The carburetor was designed with metric threads. Not many repair shops knew the correct details at the time and used what they had available.
With these conditions and 75-80 years have passed since the manufacturer of the carburetor odds of coming up with a complete correctly assembled untouched carburetor become kind of slim.
On the other hand the quantity of vehicles manufactured by Ford in the period of 1928 thru 1931 was unbelievably overwhelming. It can be done though and sometimes it takes a bit of time to scrape up the correct combination of vintage parts.
I hope you have located the correct original carburetor castings or what you would like to be restored before contacting us for restoration.
Please contact us for the restoration with the vintage ( year and month ) if required. We can then begin the research for locating the correct vintage parts.