Ok I am still having issues with the timing on my 216.. Tappets are all good Carby all good New coil New points New condenser Now dizzy cap New leads New plugs But I still have a few issues.. I'm pulling my hair out.. She runs like a pig ... Only thing I can see is the vac advance seems too move too far.. Like heaps to far compared to my 36... Is there a spring in the actuator that restricts movement ?? Or a stop I am missing?? Anyone have some pics of what it should look like?? HELP
Paul, Maybe Nate can help some when he comes back on, the dizzy I know nothing about that . Sometimes I go and work on something else until the correct thought comes to me. Sometimes the cam is bad, I had that happen on a 62 Chevy I had at one time, and I just stuck a V8 in it, but the cam was bad after one of my brothers rebuilt the engine and stuck it in his 60 Chevy. Oh, do you have any vacuum leaks by chance?
Please Define : " runs like a pig " . Yes , the entire dizzy rotates a fair goodly bit when the vacuum advance pulls . Have you dynamically timed the ignition to ball on pointer @ 700 RPM's or less ? NO vacuum signal to the dizzy when idling ? . " Valves are good " means what specifically ? . usually I find out this means ' I can't hear them clicking so I know they're fine ' when silent valves is a seriously bad thing .
Did you install a new rotor? Do you have a lot of slop in the distributor shaft? New coils, and condensers are sometimes faulty, especially those made over the pond. Just what are your symptoms? When did the problem start? My 235 transplant ran like a "Pig" also. I pulled my hair out with it too, Then took the carb apart step by step all the way to the bottom, blew air thru each passage and inspected each BB, needle valve Etc. I never did find anything but when reassembled and installed back on engine ran better than new! Good Luck, Jerry
You are a l-o-n-g ways away so my offer would probably cost too much. We have a 6 cylinder HEI distributor thats been turned on the lathe so the drive tang fits the right depth into the oil pump. It would definitely show whether the problem is distributor related or not. If a 6v vehicle we just set a 12v battery on the floor and run a ground to the engine and a hot to the "BAT" on the HEI. Have used it for years to provide fire to engines that are balky for any number or reasons. When all distributors were the point type I spent many hours at an old Sun distributor machine and realized that an engine is a distributor machine that spins the dizzy with a gas engine instead of an electric motor. If you have the facilities here is one way to check what your distributor is doing. Bring your #1 up to top dead center with the pointer on the ball bearing in the flywheel. Bend a piece of wire or tin so it's nearly touching the front crank pulley and make a mark on the pulley at that location. Measure the diameter of the pulley and divide that into 360. Example with say a 6 inch pulley: 360 degrees divided by 6 or 60 degrees per inch. Google specs for your distributor. Now with a cheap Harbor Freight tach/dwell meter and timing light you have a distributor machine. You can watch the tach and see if the advance starts moving at the correct rpm and if it's supposed to be all in at say 30 degrees total at 2500 rpm then make another a second mark on the pulley 1/2" CLOCKWISE from the top dead center mark, bring the tack reading up to 2500 and see if the pointer is on the 1/2" (30 degree) mark. If either mark is "nervous" and jumps around a lot then the dizzy has wear in it. If this is not informative at least this is long enough to hasten slumber.
