I've been having a problem with running rich and last night I wanted to see where my timing was at before posting in the carburetor forum. When I got the car I it had been set up with vacuum advance unplugged. With alot of base timing it was difficult to start and would sometimes ping at WOT. After reading though a number of posts I was looking to solve my problems by bringing the timing back and hooking up the vac advance.

With a base timing of 8* (unplugged) the car idled even richer (had been at 16*) and with the vac advance plugged in the car would ping even under the most moderate of acceleration. After a messing around a bit I couldn't get the car to run well with the vac advance plugged in. It was getting late so I decided to leave it for another day and just go back to how it was.

I road tested the car again with the advance unplugged but was getting alot of ping. I parked the car and got out the light to find that I had bumped the base timing up to around 25*. I set it back down and ran the car up and down the road. Everything seemed fine until it began to stall continously when I let up on the accelerator. Discouraged, I parked it for the night.

What is happening now is that the car will start and idle a little rough, like it's missing on one cylinder, then starts to cough and knock and eventually die . If I bring up the RPMs the engine will stay running but feels like a bad cap and wires on a damp day. Once I let go of the throttle its cough,knock,gasp and stall.

Could I have damaged a cylinder through detonation with too much timing?
Any ideas on my next step?
Thanks,
Jon


JSD MOD 27/05/08

 

I don't think you damaged a cylinder. I just think you still have the timing off. Recheck all the plug wires to make sure non got knocked loose while you were turning the distributor. Then start fresh with the timing. When you unplug the vacuum advance make sure you have a good vacuum and remember to cap off the vacuum line so not to have a leak.

Hope that helps,
Dewayne

 

Thanks Dewayne. Yeah going back to basics is always a good idea. I'm pretty sure the wiring and vacuum lines are all squared away but I'll check them on Friday. I woke up with a thought in my head this mourning; bad head gasket? I'm going to pick up a kit that tests the antifreeze in the rad for combustion vapours. We'll see.....
Jon