timing question

dewfamily

New Member
Joined
Nov 4, 2011
Location
Clarendon,NC 28432
I have replaced my old distributor with a HEI. I have it running but question is how do I set the timing. Some say to set it 8 degrees at idle, others say (and under hood) at 1600 rpms. Which do I go by? I also did the nutter bypass. I got to say the Jeep runs 1000 percent better. It idles great, but if you shoot the gas to it, it tries to stumble a little bit, clears up. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
When I did the HEI swap several years ago on my old CJ, I set the timing per the specs for my engine, at idle with distributor vacuum line disconnected and plugged.
 
try to dig up some total timing specs on line, i don't know for your kelvinator, but for a sbc with Vortec heads, they like 32-34 degrees total. You need to use a light with the adjustable advance(has a dial on the back). Rev the engine up to around 3000 rpm and check the timing with the light(vacuum line disconected), practice a few times before you rev it that high so you don't have to hold it there long, it can be un-nerving to try and check the timing with the engine reving that high. Once you get it around 28-30 degrees(or what ever you find is the correct total), let it go back to idle and check the initial timing. Once you know the initial, you know what the advance is(initial minus total) so you can adjust your initial to set your total). If your starter is having hard time starting the engine, back the timing down a little, if it pings a little when you are running at a steady rpm and load, you may want to look into an adjustable vacuum advance. Here, just watch this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYGU7mTwsZc
 
I put HEI on my 1980 CJ7 258 a couple of months ago, hooked up everyting according to instructions. I could not get it to run right no matter where or how I set the timing! It was backfiring, bogging down when on the gas, etc. One time I test drove it without hooking the vac advance back up. Ran like a CHAMP! I plugged the vac from the carb, put a cap on the dist connection and it's been running great ever since. I don't know the specifics of why I'm experiencing this, I just know it runs great!
 
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