Hello everybody.
I recently acquired a 92 convertible rs that has had a 70's sbc with carb transplant. All I know about the internals is that is a 355 with 305 heads that have been ported and polished, the cam is aftermarket with no grind number or brand of any sort on it, it has a holley dual plane intake and HAD a holley 650 dbl pmpr.
It wouldn't start when I brought it home so I put a new msd street fire HEI on it and a new edelbrock 14053. The car started. I set timing to 35° all in ~3000rpm using msd recurve kit. I used the new weights and 1 light spring along with 1 med spring. Vacuum advance is hooked into manifold vacuum. I then adjusted carb to achieve highest idle rpm. The most vacuum I can get at idle is about 12hg.
The car seems to run real good and start easily in driveway but when I take it out on the road itll turn heads when I stand on it but quickly falls on its face like it is running out of gas. Also once it gets good and hot it doesnt want to idle and becomes hard to start, but only on road everything is good in driveway.
Sorry for the lengthy 1st post but I wanted to give as much info as I could. Im bout ready to set fire to the car!!
Please help.

 

If it falls on its face like it's running out of gas, then probably .... it's running out of gas.

Leaving the electric fuel pump in the tank while attempting to suck through it with a block-mounted mechanical pump is a common cause of such things in such situations.

Idle vacuum, timing, etc. is all well and good to work on; but won't fix a fuel delivery problem.

 

Guess I should have mentioned that also...the pump had been removed and now has a holley mechanical pump.

 

You're sure about that?

As in, looked inside the tank yourself?

 

Yeah its definitely out. He even give it to me in a box of parts.

 

So today just to make sure the pump was out, I dropped the tank. (Which sucked giant monkey *****)
The pump is definitely not in there. And neither is the strainer. Just a hose clamped on the existing steel line. So im thinking I out a compression fitting with some steel line and put the strainer back in, change O.E. fuel filter, clear filter by carb and try again.
Does anybody know what the best way to attach the strainer to steel line?
Thanks for any input.

 

Is the choke opening up fully?
Break down your timing in initial, mechanical, & vacuum. With all three at 3,000rpms it should be 45-50*. I'd want my initial timing 10-16 degrees (might start hard the higher you go), another 20-25* mechanical advance. You might have to limit your vacuum advance so it won't add too much timing at cruise, to do this make a little brace that stops the vacuum advance arm from fully moving.