Timing issue after coming out of storage

1968restomod

New Member
Apr 8, 2011
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So i take the car off the road for about 1 year while finishing the body work. I did nothing to the mechanics of the car. It's a 68' Coupe with 1990 MAF EFI conversion. E303 Cam, 70 mm TB 30lbs injectors, ported intakes..etc

After completing the work and returning to the road the car ran like crap. Under load the car would misfire / pop thought the intake. This is unlike this car as it has always ran great. After trying several options from the forums...fuel pressure check..vacume..timing..etc. Nothing worked.
The timeing was dead on where it has been for 4 years, 16 degrees advanced spout off. I advanced the timing for giggles...and to my surprise the idle smoothed out a lot. I increased it to 18 Degrees. I took the car out and it ran great again. No popping no missing..perfect as it was before taking it off the road.

Heres my question. What on earth would cause a timing issue when the car was sitting getting body work done? I changed nothing mechanical. I ran the car every few weeks to warm it up.

Any thoughts are welcome. I just hope advancing the timing to get the car to run right is not covering up another issue.

Thanks in advance!