Please can anyone help me with my rebuilt 1970 360 motor? It is driving funny with only 100 miles on it. Some one suggested the vacuum off the distributior is not right. Can you guys tell me please what the timing should be set up at for this motor. It has the stock rebuilt 2 barrell carb. It lacks what ever punch it should have and sometimes burps and gasps for air it seems. Thanks in advance , Greg

 

I've seen two different dist on these, one has single advance other has adv and retard. If yours has one, it should hook to the carb above the plate and draw vac when you tap the throttle. Hook a vac guage to the intake and you should get a steady reading of 17~20Hg and set the timming to about 8~12 with the vac disconnected. vac should be steady at different rpms, hold it steady at 2000 and check again.

Get some carb cleaner and spray around the intake and base of carb to check for leaks, if the rpm moves, you've found a leak. It's common to have intake leaks with the FE under the valve covers and sometimes this will lead to oil being sucked in an engine smoke. These intakes take little more work to get a good seal. Sometimes retorqing will help. Idle the engine without valve covers and spray some carb cleaner at the intake/head area to check for leaks. Check the plugs for excess carbon and oil.

 

>I've seen two different dist on
>these, one has single advance
>other has adv and retard.
> If yours has one,
>it should hook to the
>carb above the plate and
>draw vac when you tap
>the throttle. Hook a
>vac guage to the intake
>and you should get a
>steady reading of 17~20Hg and
>set the timming to about
>8~12 with the vac disconnected.
> vac should be steady
>at different rpms, hold it
>steady at 2000 and check
>again.

Thanks for the reply. I do have a single vacuum line out of the distributor. A couple of questions. 1.) Does the vac gauge go on the carb side? 2.) Does the the other open end of the hose get plugged off? 3.) Is the timing that you are suggesting Before Top Dead Center?
I will try everything you suggest in the A.M. and see how it flies. Thanks a bunch, Greg
>
>Get some carb cleaner and spray
>around the intake and base
>of carb to check for
>leaks, if the rpm moves,
>you've found a leak.
>It's common to have intake
>leaks with the FE under
>the valve covers and sometimes
>this will lead to oil
>being sucked in an engine
>smoke. These intakes take
>little more work to get
>a good seal. Sometimes
>retorqing will help. Idle
>the engine without valve covers
>and spray some carb cleaner
>at the intake/head area to
>check for leaks. Check
>the plugs for excess carbon
>and oil.

 

The vac guage goes directly to the intake, you can use any port below the carb, power brake, pcv... It should hold steady at 17~20. Check and set the timming with the vac line disconnected and plugged and it should be about 10BTDC I thinks it's 8 for an auto tranny. Some adjust timming based on highest manifold vac and I've heard good things about that, but I do mine based on a recurved dist so I set mine at 12. Others set it to stock, the readjust carb for fastest idle (keeping advance disconnected), then check for steady vac at the intake manifold. Best timming depends on several things but this should get you in the ballpark. For a stock setup, 10BTDC is a good start. If you want, you can connect the vac guage to the vac advance hose to check that it has some vac when you tap the throttle, but that's usually something that never fails.

 

Thanks for the help. The timing has helped tremendously. I did get the vacuum you suggest out of the brake assist. I could not however get any vacuum out ofthe vacuum advance on the distributor. I set the idle to 850. My next dilemma is trying to figure out how to get the automatic choke to cooperate. There were no vacuum leaks using the carburator cleaner technique that was suggested. If you have ay pointers on the automatic choke that would be great. It is a 2 barrel stock unit. I have the truck in cherry condition and will post a photo soon.Thanks again, Greg

 

If I'm not mistaken, the vac should be from the carb to the dist and should only be for a very short period of time. Connect the guage to the carb where the vac adv line goes, rev up from idle to 2500 and you should get a brief reading. If you don't, take some carb cleaner with a hose and blow out the carb holes. timmed vac adv from the carb to the dist can account for a few mpg (or so I've been told)

 

>thinks it's 8 for an
>auto tranny. Some adjust

I was told on this list the 68 Ford shop manual says 10 btdc for the 360/automatic and they say for power tuning you can go up to 5 more additional degrees advance but that no further increase in performance will be obtained with any more. After installing an ignitor ignition in my 68 I set mine at 12 which seems to work quite well.

Gary