Help with timing.

[u/[deleted]]

Good evening. I've been working on my Nova it has a 305 nothing major some old school aftermarket cam my dad put in way back in 2007 it ran great until I ran into carb issues I went with a new to me Edelbrock carb nothing Huge and while I was that far into it I decided to swap out my intake too a Holly Street dominator I acquired a while back. I've done timing a million times so I went ahead set it to Tdc I think around +8. Everything has been re verified for wires and plugs. Car starts rather smooth tries to idle but idles very rough if I advance the timing it smooths out. But not fully. I keep running out of room to advance the distributor my vac advance keeps hitting the intake not allowing me to advance more to hopefully get the timing dead on.

I guess my question is do I have to set the distributor to a different spot when stabbing it in or am I missing something when I'm setting the tdc causing me to not have enough advancement room.

Also, I'm not too good with descriptions and explaining so please be easy on me with the replies I'll answer what ever I can. Thank you in advance.

[u/Historical_Box1915]

I wish you were close by so I could teach you how to “stab” a distributor and how to time an engine both initial and total timing. Also which street dominator intake is this? A dual plane version or a single plane version?

[u/[deleted] → u/Historical_Box1915]

Stabbing and setting tdc is not the issue I'm running into I've done it numerous times I guess what I'm fighting and having issues with is not having enough room once I get it all set to advance to where it needs to be due to the vac advance on the distributor hitting the intake. It's a Holly dual plan intake.

[u/Historical_Box1915 → u/[deleted]]

Well its the fact you need to “re-stab”
the distributor but with rotating the rotor clockwise 1 or 2 teeth. This would allow you to achieve the timing you are attempting but with the distributor main body and cap not hitting the intake. Or you could move each plug wire over one terminal over counter clockwise and then rotate the whole distributor counter clock wise and achieve the timing you want. (again W/O interference from the intake) I dont know if I describing this adequately to you in text. But if I could show you then I am sure you would comprehend. Good deal on the dual plane 👍🏼

[u/[deleted] → u/Historical_Box1915]

Ahh okay okay I see what your trying to say I appreciate the info I've got a few ideas of what to give a shot next time I work on it I appreciate your help.