Autolite 1101 to Carter YF Swap.  Issues to deal with.

 

 

                 The Autolite 1100 and 1101 have a small neck air cleaner that is ill suited for large engines such as the 240 and 300 ci six.  Moreover, the 1101, even in its largest size, with a bore of 1.29” is too small.  Furthermore, aftermarket air cleaners are not available, and the 1101 is not generally accepted as a very good carb in terms of fuel economy or performance.

 

The Autolite 1101 was used only for a few years, beginning in 1965 and being phased out by 1969 in the 300 and 240 engines.  The Carter YF that replaced it, initially as a simple manual choke unit, then later with both environmental (hot air) as well as electrical automatic chokes, proved to be more reliable.  Various forms of the YF served Ford well  until the arrival of the YFA (a similar carb).  In 1986, the 300 inline went to fuel injection.

 

For simplicity purposes, perhaps the very easiest swap from a 1101 to YF is using a carb with electric only choke.  But these seem to have came later and have some additional pollution related ports and adjustments.  So the preferred carbs are either a manual choke (which I chose) or an early automatic choke.  The automatic choke can either be re-connected to its warm air source, which I will not describe, or converted to a manual choke with readily available conversion kits.

 

First Issue:

 

Bolt spacing.  The intake manifold bolts on the 240/300 went to a slightly wider spacing at some point in the last 60’s.  The later YF carbs have a wider bolt space.  If your replacement carb has wider bolt spaces, you will need to elongate the holes with a rat tail file.  Good news is that most remanufactured carbs have had this alteration already done for you!

 

Throttle return spring.  I do not have a picture of how the 1101 is hooked up, but here is how I hooked up my YF.  Works fine.

Next issue is choke.  If you are lucky, you will have gotten the Carter WITH the choke cable bracket that holds the cable in the correct location.  Otherwise, you can either adapt your cable bracket from the 1101, or, as I did, make an adaptor that keeps the autolite bracket un-altered.  I went this route in case I ever wanted to go back to the autolite.   I used a piece of angle iron, about 3/4” wide and long, and filed it to match the profile of the carter where the choke bracket normally attaches.  I then bent the angle iron to match the correct angle to have the choke cable  going at the choke.  And then bolted the autolite bracket to this adaptor that I had made.  See pic.

See also how I used a brass electrical lug to fasten a loop of wire to the end of the choke cable.  The Carter choke wire has some sort of “Z” in the wire, but you cannot bend that into the old 1101 choke cable, as it will break.

Finally, what to do for air cleaner.  Three basic options.  One:  Go to junk yard and find an original one.  Preferralbe one that has the heated air duct and shroud that gathers the heated air.  This is useful for economy and to prevent carb icing.  Two:  Mr. Gasket makes an adaptor ring that takes you up to the 5 1/4” aircleaner that  4 bbl carbs use.  This option is least acceptable, as the plastic ring is flimsy and you also need a 3/4” riser to clear the choke linkage. Third: Mr. Gasket makes a 10” aircleaner with a smaller, neck that fits very nicely.  Summitt racing has them, Their part # is MRG-9798

Feel free to contact me with corrections to this page.  It is not exhaustive at all, but I put it together, as I was needing to answer the same questions repeatedly.  See www.fordsix.com or www.fordtrucks.com for great web sites and more info.