MTFCA Forum

I'm the proud new owner of a 1911 T touring that's equipped with the correct holley carb. I'm having difficulty getting it to start when cold. I've owned a few T's with later carbs that haven't had this issue.
My question is this - cast into the venturi is an weighted air valve that I assume opens at higher rpm. Is there supposed to be a spring helping keep the valve closed during cranking? The car will start if it's towed and it starts and runs quite well when warm. When hand cranking cold the spark plugs are dry. I'm thinking that the air valve may be opening letting air in but or course no fuel. I've opened the mixture screw a number of turns but no change.
I've been looking everywhere, however, other than some pictures there isn't a lot of information on this particular carb that I can find.
Any and all input would be appreciated

You may very well have the fuel level too low in the bowl.

I thought that as well, however, I've adjusted the float height so its just on the verge of flooding with no change. I had my neighbor put his hand on the carb inlet while I gave it a couple of pulls and he said that there was virtually no vacuum produced. Tried it again with the carb off and said there was lots of vacuum

Maybe its not the carb. You say it runs well when warmed up; maybe leaking manifolds downstream of the carb. Is your ignition system in good shape? The old adage, 90% of carburetor problems are electrical.

I've run an 11 Holley carb for a few years. They can be difficult to start. Flood the bowl for 3 seconds. Crank it 5 times with the ignition off. Turn the ignition on and cank.
A problem I had at first was the tickler was not lowering the float enuf to flood it. Once I realizes the problem, I unscrewed the cap over the needle and flooded the carb by lifting the arm and lowering the float.
Frankly I like them better than Kinngston 5 balls
There is no spring. Just the weight over the air valve

Thanks. I played some more today to no avail. I pulled a Kingston 5 ball off Brush and after richening the mixture a few turns it fired right up. I pulled the NH off of my 27 T and it also fires up after a couple of pulls.
Thanks for the advice on the spring. I was pretty sure there wasn't supposed to be one.
I have flooded the carb until there was a steady stream of gas running out the bottom but no joy.
I pulled a Stromberg OF out that I bought years ago for a 15 T that Ii had but the NH worked so well I never bothered with it. It's been given a bath and will go on the car tomorrow if I have time.
I'll report back