I had my engine holding 400RPM last night, at 550RPM it was SMOOTH as hell. Going through my stock muffler it sounded like a kitten (when we ran it open headers it sounded like a Nascar).

Other then the fact I'm only pulling 7PSI of vacuum at idle the cam sounds way to docile (we're going to check to see if some valves are hung open causing me to lose vacuum). With 14 degrees of overlap I had hoped for some noticable "lope". It isn't there, now I'm wondering if I should have gone 274, I spent too much time and money to build a 350 to run 14.2s.

Is it supposed to be this smooth? It ran as smooth as my buddies 350 with the standard CC 268H. What gives?

 

Something is wrong in there..the XE268 will give a nice lope at idle...and my XE274 pulls 11-12" vacuum at 750rpm hot idle.My guess is you may have wiped a few lobes out..been there done that.How did you break it in?

 

It probably only has about 30 total running minutes on it, no high RPMs, everything under 2500-3000 just trying to get a feel for throttle response and such.

I can't idle 750, we get it to 650 and vacuum advance FINALLY kicks in and it revs 1200-1400, so until I get the vacuum canister we just have it idling 500. Havn't driven it yet running right, took it out with a bad distributor and put maybe 2 mileson it, no WOT, all easy to get a feel.

 

Did you bring the car up to 2500-3000rpm's for the first 30-35 minutes you had it running to break th cam in?Or did you fire it up and just let it idle and stab it here and there to check throttle response?The cam break in is crucial to cam life..if you didn't do it properly..you more than likely wiped out the cam..which means you will need a new one.That would explain the smooth idle and loss of vacuum.Have ou changed the break in oil yet to fresh with a new filter.if so how much metal was in it?

 

The motor held 1500-2000RPM the first time we started it up for a good 5-10 minutes while we tried to figure out why it would not hold idle below 1500RPM. We took it out for a drive, and it no power, I was very light on the throttle, we were going like 20MPH, we went maybe 1 mile. 2nd time out the car stalled 3 blocks from my boss' house, the car wouldn't start, it got flatbedded back (bent flexplate, starter wouldnt' engage, thats fixed, we shoulda checked the flexplate b4 using it)

Ill be sure to check the oil on saturday when I change it.

The car had almost no drive time on it, and all the time previous was mostly just the engine holding 1500-2000RPM as we tried to tinker with the timing.

When that new distrib went in the other day(by new i meant the 3rd one we tried), it was the first time the engine had ever ran smooth. We ran it for 20 minutes tuning it, listening, and tinkering with ignition, and right before my boss shut it off, he reved it a 4-5 times to 3 grand. Hes built 100 motors before (albeit mopars) so I just have to trust his judgement, his garage, his tools, all his help and time made this possible. He thinks I have a few valves hung open, and more tuning issues on the carb. Open headers, the car sounded like a nascar, it sounded like I thought it would sound, but through the stock exhaust, it sounded almost like my 305.

If my cam is toast, I'd like to ask:

hows the 274 treat you? Could I daily drive that cam? I only drive 10miles for work/school combined a day not counting cruising around. I talked to pony killer a while back and it sounded like it was possible, but maybe not the most streetable. I wanted 274, but my boss thought 268 would be better, that I might regret getting too much cam. At this point, I'd be willing to dish the extra 500$ for a new converter if it mean't more power assuming I could maintain vacuum and driveability.

 

I could easily drive my car daily with the XE274...but I run a manual trans so that is a big help in driveaility.I find the cam totally streetable..just kills me on gas mileage with the 750DP and 3.73's.Plus I drive 115 miles a day to work and back so there is no way I could afford to drive it every day.Depending on you heads,intake and carb it may be a little to big for your combo...you would probably gain some horse up top..but lose too much torque on the bottom and kill the fun factor on the street toying around.If you have the money to go to a new convertor..swap in the XE274 if you are looking for more power.Vacuum is no problem as I have nver had any issues with my power brakes or steering...so that isn't even an issue.HTH

 

Manual def makes a camed car more driveable....I don't drive far to work or school so it's not a big deal.

I'll think about it, I have vortec heads and everyone says they can support around 400HP.