I just tried the silver that is suppose to net me 25* and it netted me 18 (38*total with 20*initial)

should I be concerned with the differences from what they are and what they should be according to the MSD book and try to rectify it or just go with what they actually are and set it up from there....

Thing is I am planning on running vacuum advance so I may need a lower initial as the vacuum will add 20* to it

 

1. Are you revving high enough for full centrifugal advance?

2. Why not restrict that vacuum advance some? 10--15 degrees would probably be plenty.

 

1. Are you revving high enough for full centrifugal advance?

2. Why not restrict that vacuum advance some? 10--15 degrees would probably be plenty.

Shurkey brings up an excellent point...Which springs are you running & what RPM are you revving it to? IMO the light silver springs & black bushing give 18* all in by 25-2600.

 

Mark, mine is dead on with the black bushing. My initial is 18 and total is 36. I'm running a pro billet #85551 with no vac advance though. I would guess that the vacuum is messing it up. What distributor are you running?

 

Mine is a 8361 VA , I am trying it without the VA hooked up and the line pluged....reving it plenty high enough to make sure its all in , even had the light springs in it and got the same differences in the numbers...

would still having the the can attached to the dist stop the timing from coming back all the way

 

Experienced the same with my 8361. It was dead on with my old heads and cam. Blue and black bushing gave the 18/21 the instructions suggested they would. I then swapped heads/cam and using the black only so far gave me 14. No matter what I tried it was always 4* short. Did a lot of research, talked with MSD all to no avail…. I just upped the vacuum advance to get my idle timing where I wanted it and made sure total was good. Been that way for 2 years now. But to be 9* short is a lot to me.

 

Have had black bushings off by 3 but not that far .

 

I have probably run 50 MSD distributors across my Distributor dyno and I have never seen the black bushing not do the 18 degrees, within one degree.

Did you by any chance change the nut or washer that holds the bushing in place??

Keith

 

What could cause it to lose timing in my case? Same intake and bottom end. Head and cam swap (reused timing chain and MSD 8361) and I lost 4 degrees. Dead nuts on 18 before the swap? Changed nothing on the dist itself, removed and cleaned it, reinstalled when the time came.

 

just got back from the dyno , decided to use the silver bushing that gave me 18* advance , ran 38 total and 20....keep a close eye on it , stay'ed constant all day

drove it 20 miles on the hwy nice and easy (maybe 1 or 2 little side way boogie's) to dyno , ran a couple mild pulls , did some tweaking , tried a good pull and blew the tires off by about 5000 so the rest is in the air and shut er down....

HeHeHeHeHe !!!!!! stoped and got some track claw solution and have been soaking up the Mickey ET's on the prosatrs that have been sittin in the garage , going back tomorrow in the morn and gonna pull er ..... dude runnin the dyno was blown away how it blew the tires off it , he's gonna lube the drums and clean the tops with some good sticky stuff for the mornig now that he sees what he is dealing with......

Cheers to Mike Lewis :beers:

 

Gotta love it when the dyno man has to get ready for you !!!! Good Luck