Lackluster Power

[68post]

If you do tear into it check your cam timing with a degree wheel , the quality of timing chain sets is not what it used to be.

 

[firebane]

Alright so I went in and I went through it and completely rechecked everything and started from scratch.

1) Dot on distributor rotor lines up with rotor on the top

2) Tissue paper in hole.. *pop* .. insert wire. Turn over balancer TDC is almost 100% spot on with timing mark. Rolled back so 0* mark was around 8* BTDC to get the truck started.

3) Put cap on distributor marked where #1 terminal was on base of distributor

4) Inserted distributor and locked down pointing at #1 cylinder

5) Put cap on with rotor pointing to #1 terminal

Truck fires up and runs. BUT the thing is when it was running I grabbed the timing light and it went from being at around 8* BTDC and jumped to 8-10* ATDC
based off of this timing tape (http://shop.advanceautoparts.com/wcs...5_pri_larg.jpg)

The numbers are so that I can read them when I'm facing the front of the engine and not put on backwards. I then advance the distributor again to put timing pointer to 8* BTDC again.

If its jumping from 8* BTDC to 8* ATDC that would mean initial install of cam would be 16* retarded?

I am going out in a few minutes to pickup a dial back timing light as well to help with this but thinking maybe something else is up?

 

[350runner]

engine off what direction do the numbers on the tape read? left to right or right to left?

Sent from the dust in front of you!

 

[firebane]

I figured out the timing tape debacle which makes sense now.

Which means I'm putting my distributor in at 8* BTDC but when the truck fires up and starts to run its at 8* ATDC according to the tape which well doesn't make any sense.

But I have a dial back timing light now so once I get it running tomorrow maybe I'll have a better idea of what is going on.

But since everything checks out I still can't figure out why I'm loss of power in the 2-2500rpm range.

 

[firebane]

Ok so I don't know if any one of these two events cause another but here is what happened tonight.

I stuck my dial back on and checked the timing and bumped it up so its running at 15* BTDC. Took it for a run.. same ****.

So I got thinking about how I was doing some reading last night and people say you should have a spark plug gap of .040-0.045 and this got me thinking. My truck is from 1974 and GM/Chev didn't introduce HEI until 1975. So when I ordered the plugs for my truck I ordered them for a 1974 which come gapped @ .030 . So I grabbed a 0.020 and a 0.024 that I had lying around and regapped the plugs.

Now after I did this I got the truck running and now it was bellowing a ton of blue smoke which it didn't do before and reallllly got me puzzled. So I shut the truck off and started re-checking crap again and I found that linkage for the main flap was locked shut.. WTF!

So I fixed that and took it for a drive and hot damn she'll crank right over to 4k no issues now!!

So I don't know if it was a combination of the choke holding the flap closed or the gap being to small but either way the truck is running good now and I thank everyone in here for putting up with me.

Now its onto fixing the front end because that poor old 4x4 hasn't seen any love in a LONG time.

 

[350runner]

Wow just wow. It's amazing how it's always the little things .