I purchased this car about a week ago. It is a 1984 Chevy Camaro Z-28 that originally came with a 5.0L HO. From what i am told, the 5.0 was swapped out for a 383 strocker motor, though i am not sure how this can be confirmed unless i take it apart as he had none of the reciepts. Anyway, the problem. Will start with no problems at all, idles ok when not under load. Once you put it in gear the idle becomes very rough and there appears to be a miss, so rough in fact that i have to put it into neutral in order to keep the vibration in check and to ensure it does not die. When you hit the accelerator it is slugish at first but then accelerates well, though you can still feel a miss. From what i can see, it is the stock HEI distributor with Accel coil, new plug wires, im told new plugs, edelbrock carburator, edelbrock manifold, and all the emisions have been removed. What i am basicly asking for is a starting point in diagnosing this as the accelration on this motor is awsome, even with the miss and i am sure that once that is taken care of it will be an awsome drive. Thanks in advance to anybody that can help me.

 

Might be a timing issue. Check the distributor timing and adjust it if you need to. Try a few different settings and pick which one you like best.

 

Have a new distributor that i am picking up today, don't know if i will have time to put it on tonight, but am doing that along with rebuilding the edelbrock carburetor. will post the results once that is done, hopefully it fixes the problem.

 

It may be too much cam and a stock converter...

 

i have been doing some more research on this site and have found alot of answers for fuel injected vehicles and i am thinking i can use alot of the strategies for diagnosing my problem. last night went and purchased a vacuum gauge and will test the engine as shown on the forums. i will hold off on putting in the new distributor and all the other things until i get the results from the test. i will post my findings on this so maybe it will help out the next person who has this problem. I had not thought about the cam-stall scenario, that is a good point. i was told that it was running fine though, so i dont know if that is the case.

 

Easy enough to see if it has a stroker motor, look at the harmonic balancer (damper) it will be "fat" and have a cut-out on it for the crank balance. (unless it's internally balanced [expensive])
A vacuum gauge is a good tool to have. A quick check of the vacuum at 800 rpm idle in neutral will show if it has a "big" cam. Post back your readings. (if it won't idle below 900 is another clue)
p.s. a big cam will have LOTS of power above 2000 rpm.

 

I think the cam is a good place to start.
If you were only told that the Plugs were new, I think it's an idea to check... And, Make sure all of the Plug wires are plugged in all the way... just to be sure?

 

Or sounds like this when it idles... you may have "nasty-cam syndrome".