Here is the deal. I have an 84 302 in my bronco. I did a compression test and had a spread of 158psi to 168 psi with most falling in at 165psi. I had a pair of c80e heads from a 68 302 rebuilt and installed along with an RV cam (262/272adv dur,204/214 .050 dur with .448/.472 lift) I installed an older hirise 2V manifold with a 2100 2v carb. Now for the problem using timing light I set her up at 15deg BTDC. Seemed real sluggish and had no indication if detonation, which is surprising due to the short block having flat tops and the heads having 62cc chambers. I talked to a friend and he said to time it for best vacume and than back it off till it stops pingin. I did this, but here is the problem. My timing light says I have 30 degrees BTDC at idle and 55degrees at cruise. This can't be correct. When I installed everything I did it with the number one cylinder up, cam straight up and timing marker on 0degrees BTDC. Fired her up and broke her in, no temp problems or rough idle, but real sluggish. I had to turn the distributor so much I had to jump the plug wires one hole over clockwise on the distributor. She runs allot better and has a slight ping at full throttle and heavy load, fuel mileage dramatically increased and she sounds allot smoother.

Q- Why does it say I have so much timing, Is it even possible to run this much timing?

Q-could the fact that I used a later block with a later cam firing order and switched in a RV cam with an earlier firing order, cause the discrepancy

Q-Could my timing light, timing marker, or timing marks on the balancer be off?

Thanx.

 

ok, let me get this straight. you have a late model block and a old firing order RV cam, correct? ummm....the cam should be fine, but just for kicks, set your distributor with the #1 pointing to the #1 cylinder to start off. try the HO firing order instead of the trucks 154...firing order. to do this, switch the #5 with the #3 and the #4 with the #7. try that. if it doesnt run right, or has no power, go back to the trucks designed firing order. u shouldnt have any problems with a different firing order with your truck, i swapped in a HO out of a mustang into my truck,(using the mustang cam and firing order), and everything ran fine after a minor vacuum problem that had me chasing my tail. hope this helps a little.

 

The answer to your questions is pretty much yes to them all.
You can run it with that much timing. It will have detonation. So don't run it untill you track down your problem.
Call the cam mfg. and confirm your firing order.
Older balancers can slip the ring. Get it to TDC and put your own mark on the balancer to see what you get. I really like to use an adjustable timing light. It makes it easier to dial it in.
Make sure your distributor isn't 180 degrees off.
Check for vaccum leaks.

 

Let’s see. 1) New balancer 2) Confirmed firing order 3) #1 plug wire/#1cylinder TDC
Check on all of the above.

This is what I have done.
After running the 30 timing with detonation I tuned the carb adjusting the idle needles till I had a very smooth needle in the vacume gauge. I started taking timing out a few degrees at a time. Got rid of pinging, and I kept adjusting carb to keep the vacume at 17 on the gauge. What I found out was at 20 degrees she came alive. Way more power than 15 degrees or 30. Matter of fact there seems to be a sweet spot between 18-21 degrees. Not only does she have a lot more power but she also appears to be getting better mileage. I got 13mpg with 15degrees so we will see what I get now.

Now this can be a bit misconstrued by an off timing light. I due have the kind with a degree **** on it and that’s how I'm coming up with the timing. It is ten years old and could possible be showing its old age. I'm sure of the cams firing order but I'm going to try swapping the plugs just to see the difference. Thanx guys