Distributor vaccum line....was told to UNPLUG IT?? #2

85_SS_302_Coupe

it sucks (I know) to be on the receiving end
15 Year Member
Nov 11, 2003
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Northern KY
Ok the first time i posted this it wouldnt show any text, so here i go again.


I was told by a local speed shop guy to unplug my distributor vaccum advance and just leave it unplugged. He said with the timing advanced to 14 degrees, that the disy would have plenty of timing. I'd never heard of this but i gave it a shot and now my car's running stronger than ever! Is this one of those old school hotrodder tricks or is this just new to me? Anyone know of any drawbacks to this?
 
I wouldn't do that - I think you'll find that without the vacuum advance, and with the initial set at 14, you're gonna have too much total advance. Vacuum advance usually retards the timing under high vacuum conditions. And it should be connected to a 'ported' vacuum connection on the carb (long time since I messed with these - I could be wrong). If you lower initial timing to limit total timing, you won't have enough timing at low rpm to make it drivable.

My guess is that your car will run best if you have around 14-16 degrees initial advance, and then another 16-20 degrees of centrifugal advance for a total of about 34 degrees. And if you can have that all in by around 2600-3000 rpm, that curve ought to work pretty good.

To get there, you need to know how much centrifugal advance the distributor is set up for. Here's how you check. Make a small degree wheel out of a piece of cardboard. Punch a hole in the middle so it will fit over your distributor with the rotor removed. Use a compass to lay out a range of about 0 to 20 degrees marked around the outside of the 'wheel' - 0 to 20 going in the counterclockwise direction. Put it over the dizzy, and put the rotor back on. Orient the wheel so that the rotor is pointing at 0 degrees. Now, hold the wheel steady, and rotate the rotor against the force of the internal centrifugal advance springs as far as it will go. Note where the rotor is pointing relative to your wheel. My guess is that it will rotate about 15 degrees.

That amount of rotation X two (the dist. rotates at half crank speed) is the amount of centrifugal advance that distributor is adding.

You can see that if you've got 15 degrees centrifugal at the dizzy, that's 30 degrees at the crank. Add that to your initial of 14 and you've got 44 degrees of total - which is WAY too much. You'll need to limit the amount of centrifugal by limiting how far out the weights can swing (you'll have to get under Hall sensor to see how to do that - the springs and weights are under there). You'd want to limit them in a way so that when you try to rotate the rotor, that it only swings about 9 or 10 degrees (that'll give you 18 to 20 degrees centrifugal at the crank). Add that to your 14 initial and you've got your total of 34.

To get it come in earlier in the rpm range, disconnect and plug your vacuum advance. Warm the car up, put your timing light on it, and set it at 14 initial. Then, while holding the light on it slowly open the throttle up while watching what the timing is doing. Someone will have to watch the tach for you. You want to see at what rpm the timing STOPS increasing. Likely up around 4000 rpm or so, all your centrifugal advance will be in. Whatever that total advance is (look for it to be up over 40), subtract your initial advance from it, and that's your centrifugal advance. To bring the cent. advance in earlier (down around 3000) you'll need a set of lighter advance springs.

In summary - if you unplug the vacuum advance, you'll want to recurve the distributor to limit centrifugal advance and to bring the full centrifugal in at a lower rpm. Best I can do over the net. I've recurved several of my own. I can tell you that an Accel recurve kit for a small block Chevy has springs that work perfectly in a 1600cc Toyota 2TC hemi to bring the total cent. in by 2500 rpm!