Okay so im drivin home... wasnt speedin to much.... i was goin 85-90... for like 5 miles while i was pullin off the fwy... i started hearing a thump when i tried to give it gas. baaarely made it uphill to my house. I couldnt see tooo well cuz it was like 1230am. so i get home let it sit for a while.... go back out and start it up... same deal... i trace the sound... its comin from the carb. take the air cleaner off... look inside the bowl... and zap!... i see a spark shoot from under the choke. every thump i heard was a spark under the choke... what the hell is this?

 

Spark or flame. A flame would be a intake backfire.

 

definetly a spark.... you can hear a tick from the spark... but throughout the car sounds like a thump... like mini backfire.

 

sounds like a broken valve, or the valve is not closing properly or maybe the distributor is firing too early? too many variables with what you've given us...

 

I would start with checking the ignition. You could have a bad spark plug wire that is arcing to another wire or a bad cap that is arcing to another terminal. Also check the timing. These are the easy things to check. I wouldn't want to think about a burnt valve.$$$$$

 

well i got all dirty today... changed the coil... changed the module.... same deal... then remember that one of the lifters was sticking... so i had the car running and tried to find the bad cylinder... i unplugged each wire from the cap one at a time... found it... its kinda late right now to get further but im gonna get under the valve cover to see whats up... so its running better on 7 cylinders.... ill see what happens tomorrow morn. its making a destint popping sound from the carb but its not a prob with the carb...

 

I was sooooooooo frickin close to gettin the bird back in the air and snap! broken bolt in the head. it turns out that the exhaust valve was sticking... why? the rocker arm nut nearly came off of the rocker arm itself... so it was just hanging there away from the pushrod... LUCKILY the pushrod didnt fall into the block. thank ***. the sound i was hearing was the exhaust building up in the cylinder since the valve was stuck and it backfired up towards the carb... still doesnt explain the spark i saw but oh well maybe thats just what a shot of extremely hot exhaust at 1am looks like