Is a "straight through" crab that much better over the common NH?

It must be. The rebuilt one I saw for sale Saturday had a $200 price tag on it.

I've nothing against crabs, but I meant carb....Duh...

Less meat, but tastier I've been told.

Joe, I've heard nothing but good things about them.

I find there is not much difference. Save your money for a U & J carb or a Winfield carb.

Ok, I'm new to the forum. Lots of abbreviations used when discussing carburetors. What do you mean by straight through?

Also, would someone like to decode for me all of the insider terms/references used here for T carburetors?

The first versions of the Holley 'NH' (new holley) have a straight through air cylinder for maximum passage. Later models have a 'sway back' or dip in the passage.

Forgot to add this image of the 'sway-back' showing the passage. These are the common Holley NH and perform well.

The other names you see are accessory carbs for the Ford, so many too hard to list. Many mfg. made aftermarket carbs, for economy, racing, poor gasoline, even combo carbs to burn gasoline, then kerosene in the Ford.

Gary, the carb under discussion here is the Holly Model NH. Sometimes the name on the tag is Ford Model NH or Ford Model F, but it's all the same critter.

Note the dip in the center if this carburetor. This is the most common version of the NH. There's another one without that dip, called the straight-through NH. It's pretty scarce. I think the one I saw for sale Saturday was the first one I've seen. I've never used one, so I'll defer to Royce's opinion on it. So far I'm satisfied with my regular swayback NH.

I can testify to the improvement in installing a straight thru NH
On my Pick up. The 26 engines are fairly "dead" in comparison to the Veterans. I tried a Z head, electronic ignition and new ignition coils. However the change to a straight thru (from the standard 1926 NH) had the most effect. The car now pulls away up hill in top gear where as before I would have been in low gear on my test hill. I'm now looking for one more for the third T that we have. Alan in Western Australia

Stan Howe rebuilt my straight through so I knew it was done correctly. I installed it on my stock 1915 and found it a little hard starting.

Put it on my 1927 Touring with electric start and I LOVE the extra "giddy-up". Definitely improved the power and the electric start got rid of the back breaking hand cranking required for the 1915.

I now have a Stromberg on the 1915 that I am happy with.

I had NH strait thrus on four of my 'Ts',I like them, they run better at higher RPMs than a latter NH, But I replaced the one on my 24 coup with one of Stans OFs. WOW what a difference, smother idle,better pickup and top end. Don

Gary - To add a bit to what's been said above, another sure way to identify an NH Holley "straight through" carburetor, is that if the carburetor is off of the car, you can hold it up to your eyes, and with choke/throttle butterflies wide open, you can literally see "straight through" the carburetor,.....not so with the much more common "swayback" NH Holley,.....FWIW,......harold

Well "shoot"!!! Now that I look back, one of Dan's great pictures posted above, clearly shows what I just said! Sorry Dan,....another case of stupidly not re-reading entire thread before posting,.....harold

Steve, You mean you missed the one out at Bakersfield? The guy who had it said he didn't know if it worked or not, it had been sitting on his desk for 15 years as a decoration. I took the bowl off and it looked like it was all there too. said I could have it for $50.00. It looked pretty good, was clean and all that, but I'm not into Holley NH's...might go a decent G, but that's about it. Derrick was looking at longingly too, but didn't want to spend the dough.