Take a seat on the Blackbird Performance therapy couch. Now imagine Blackbird’s Geoff Turk sliding his glasses down to the end of his nose as he leans over to put a calming hand on your knee and softly say, “It’s okay to run a carburetor on a Gen. 3 Hemi.”
Some would be rattled, but it’s the prescription many need to get out of the mindset that every G3 Hemi has to have electronic fuel injection (EFI). While that modern technology can certainly be wonderful, it can also be painful to install and troublesome to troubleshoot.
Let’s face it, carburetors are still king when it comes to simplicity. A well-tuned carb will start, idle, and run nearly as well as EFI, especially in a race car or fair-weather warrior application. All of Blackbird’s naturally aspirated Race Spec crate engines come standard with a good old fashioned four-barrel for this easy reason: it works.
It’s critical to remember that throwing a carburetor atop a modern 5.7L or 6.4L Hemi doesn’t take away any of the G3 platform’s other plentiful benefits.
You still get a heavy duty block good for 1,000 HP, a stout factory roller valvetrain that’ll pump past 7,000 RPM, a reliable coil-on-dual-plug ignition that can run standalone on Blackbird’s Afterburner, and absolutely incredible cylinder heads.
Imagine what it would take to get a 440 wedge up to all of those specs.
Just put the injectors down, stop crying about wiring, and grab that ol’ 4150 off the shelf. It’s all going to be OK. See you next session for a different but similar topic: G3 Hemis with vintage, non-overdrive transmissions (gasp!).
