Back on the Road

 After getting the distributor re-installed, once realizing it was off by a tooth or two, she fired right up.  Surprisingly, the engine idled at 750-800 rpm's without even touching the carb.  I think it will need a little adjustment, as once I put a timing light on it and backed the timing down to real world numbers, it no longer wants to idle without a little throttle.  The engine miss that nagged me last year seems to be gone, but a new miss arrived arrived a 10 mile drive, which I suspect is from the carb being slightly rich.  Until I learn whether this carb comes with reusable gaskets, I'm going to leave it alone, and order up a gasket kit if need be.

I'm sure you're wondering how she's running.  This past winter's upgrades made a HUGE improvement.  I would venture to say in the 50-100 hp range of improvement.  It was fast before, but now, it's ridiculously fast!  I would still say the combination is in the 700-725 hp range, but I feel that the previous system, including the carb, was starving the engine.  I also feel that it likely wasn't the carb causing the engine miss as much as it was my $12 paper fuel filter, which allowed large enough particles to get to the needle and seat.

With it up and running, I decided to take it up to work and show a follow co-worker, who is also into old cars, though more of a streetrod kind of guy.  After stopping by work, I swung into Doc's, a local mechanic a few doors down from work.  Doc has his own little toy, a 69 Chevelle that runs 9.30's on the motor! He's gunning for 8's on the engine, and then will add the laughing gas.  I really need to go watch his car run one of these days.

I still have plenty of finishing touches.  I bought sheet metal to make dash mounting plates in order to mount my speedometer and tach.  I will also need to mount my ignition switch, headlight switch, and toggle switch for one set of fans.  The headlight switch is my greatest concern, as it's a monster, and won't fit where the factory put it due to the roll cage.  Due to it's size, my options are somewhat limited.  I also have a slow coolant leak from an intake fitting, and oil mist still coming from my engine breather, which leads me to believe that a factory pcv system just isn't going to work on this engine.  All this stuff is minor things, with the bulk of the work accomplished, and the wife done teaching for the summer, it will be much easier to wrap things up now.

I can't foresee any reason I won't be at this year's downriver cruise, which is 9 days away.  Sadly, as will be the case for most of the summer, I have to work that day and will only be able to attend for 1/2 a day.