Couldn't help but to throw in a "This one time... at band camp..."
story. I had a 390 in a 72 F250 that developed "excessive clearance between the distributor shaft and ditributor shaft gear" or well, actually I think it was the shaft and the bearings. Anyway, one night on the way back home from the drive-in movie it all came to a head, left me stranded. I could get it to start but it wouldn't run over an idle... somehow, in my trials... I discovered that if I pulled forward on the distributor itself it ran a lot better. Yes... I did it... one bungie chord wrapped around the radiator bracket and the dizzy later and we were back on the road. It got me home at least, bearings were shot in that thing. I put a reman dizzy in it with a solid state elec. ignition conversion kit in it and never had any more trouble out of it... and that ignition conversion kit was the best $70 I ever spent. Never had to fool with points again.