-WEBER HISTORY.-

By Pat Braden
Weber Carburetors
Published by HPBooks, 1988, 1st ed.  Los Angeles.
P. 6-9.
 

Origins -- Born in Turin, Italy in 1889, Edoardo Weber worked in the Fiat plant briefly before taking the job of service manager for a Fiat dealership in Bologna, in 1914.  In 1920, gasoline was very expensive in Italy, so he went into business for himself making kerosense-conversion kits for trucks.  In 1925, he switched to producing hop-up kits for Fiats.

The earliest Weber carburetor known was part of such a kit.  It was a sidedraft, double-throat carburetor that bolted to a Weber designed overhead-valve/supercharger conversion for the 501 Fiat.  The carburetor throats were of different diameters.  The idea of using two different sized throats (a small one for low speeds and a larger one for high speeds) appears to have been a Weber original.

Weber used his two-throat carburetor to control whether or not the engine was supercharged.  At anything less than wide-open throttle (WOT), a cut-out valve leaked the pressurized air from the supercharger to the atmosphere.  The engine then ran, unpressurized, from the smaller throat.  At full throttle, the cut-out valve closed and the engine was supercharged through the second throat of the carburetor.

Weber discovered that his design of two different-sized throats could be used without a supercharger to gain fuel economy.  The larger throat would be used for maximum performance and the smaller for economy.  It was not long before two-throat carburetors became common conversions for Fiat 501s used as taxicabs in Italy in the late '20s.
 

Renault A110 Apline came with dual Weber side draught carburetors as standard equipment

Early Racing Efforts -- Weber was certainly a pioneer of two-throat carburetion, and he begun using two throats of identical sizes to feed separate cylinders of the engine.  The 1931 Maserati 1100cc Grand Prix car featured the first two-throat sidedraft Webers, the 50 DCO.

The earliest Webers you're likely to find date from the classic Alfa Romeo cars of the same era.  These Alfas were straight-8s with twin camshafts and either one or two superchargers, depending on displacement.  The most successful of these Alfas, the Tipo 2900 of 1933, carried a pair of Weber single-throat updraft carburetors sitting beneath its two superchargers.

Another early Weber was the three-throat 50 DR3C fitted to the Type 158 Alfa, a Grand Prix car that would ultimately (in 1951) use two-stage supercharging to develop 404 HP from just 91.5 CID (cubic inches displacement).  Three throats were necessary to supply even air/fuel flow along the entire length of the supercharger vanes.

The success of Weber equipped cars made Weber successful as a carburetor manufacturer.  His early experimental association with Fiat, Maserati and Alfa Romeo finally attracted attention world-wide.  In addition, Weber wisely courted the Italian car manufacturers to become their supplier of carburetors.  He was so successful that virtually every Italian car, from the smallest Fiat to the most exotic Ferrari, carries Weber carburetion.

In addition to good design and salesmanship, Weber offered fabulous customer support.  According to Alf Francis, in his book, Alf Francis -- Racing Mechanic, Weber technology came to England in 1952 when Alf asked to have a pair of Webers fitted to an Alta.  An immediate 7-HP increase was recorded on the dyno.  After some fiddling (and the design and fabrication of an entirely new intake manifold), the 117-HP Alta was pumping out 143 HP.  The total bill to Francis was only for the two carburetors, no charge for days of dyno testing or for the fabricating the intake manifold.

Finally, Weber has consistently maintained excellent quality control of its components.  For example, each jet is individually flowed, and the flow results determine the number marked on the jet.

After Edoardo Weber's death in 1945m Fiat began taking an active interest in the welfare of the company and succeeded in buying more than half of it by 1952.  Fiat was very active in racing during this period, first with Siata and then Abarth.  Both those marques used Weber carburetion almost exclusively, and gained plenty of headlines for themselves and Weber as well.
 
 

From left to right; 1976 Aston Martin DB6, DB6 Vantage sports triple DCOE Webers, and earlier model DB4 Vantage's powerplant

U.S. Introduction -- In the U.S., Webers were first imported by the Geon company during the early '50s.  They were virtually mandatory accessories for drivers of Jaguars and MGs hoping to win the public-road races that characterized the competition of the period.

It wasn't long however, before stateside owners of Alfa Romeo Giulietta and Opel 1.3-liter cars discovered that the Fiat DCD Weber was a bolt-on fit.  And, it supplied more power and better driveability than the original-equipment Solex.  Further, the DCD's replacements, the DGV, and DFAV, are bolt-on replacements for the Holley 5200 carburetor series.  So, Webers began appearing on Ford products as replacement carburetors for this Holley.

Also contributing to Weber's success is the large variety of carburetor types the company offers.  Carburetor styles currently include single-, double- and triple throat downdraft and dual-throat sidedraft units.  (The single-throat sidedraft is a collector's item.)  The dual downdraft carburetors have either simultaneous or progressive throttle simultaneous or progressive throttle linkages and float bowls placed either to the side or between the throats.  As a result, you can create an almost ideal carburetor setup with Webers, no matter how odd the application.

And, in many applications, you'll be able to change all of the most important features of the carburetor without removing it from the engine.  DCOE sidedraft Webers are especially notable for the accessibility of their jets.  On most, the jet carriers are accessible even with the air cleaner attached.

Weber design principles have been adopted by several other manufacturers.  Weber work-alikes are produced in Italy (Dellorto) and Japan (Mikuni).

As Weber's applications in the U.S. have grown, so has its distribution channels.  Geon, an early national distributor, became BAP/GEON.  But that firm has now been replaced by INTERCO as the distributor for the states east of the Mississippi.  Redline, Inc. is the official Weber importer for the U.S.  Several independent importers, such as TWN Induction in Goleta, CA, simply buy their carburetors directly from Italy.  An entire industry of Weber specialists has grown up, and most major U.S. cities have at least one shop specializing in Webers.

Over the years, Weber has grown from a small company in Italy to the premier worldwide supplier of specialist carburetors.  A standard of quality continues to distinguish Weber products from their competition.  Edoardo Weber wouldn't have it any other way.