Hey guys, latley my car has been running bad and popin threw the carb andit was to rich and all that, so I figured it was a combo of timming and fouled plugs cause my valve guides are bad and my plugs foul out alot. So I change my plugs and I go to check my timing and its at 3degrees. now I had it at10-11 so how did it get down that low?? I was completly amazed it was even runnin with that little of timing.

 

Mmmmm, maybe the clamp wasn't quite tight? Of course, it never is that simple though, huh...

 

check your blancer my small block blazer had a horrible time keeping timing and it ended up the blancer was bent

 

Distributor clamp not tight first thought. Simple thing to check. Most likely cause

Also check the vacuum advance if you had it connected to manifold vacuum. Vacuum diaphram could have a hole.

Check the advance weights also. Make sure they aren't sticking. Now, you should not be getting any mechanical advance at idle....but I've seen lots of cars that had too light of advance springs installed and they were getting advance at idle. Not good.

 

If you have alot of slop in the timing chain, it will retard mechanical timing as well. Usually you can see the timing jump around a bit if that's the case too.