Hi Yall,
Haven't been around here much lately as I picked up the family and moved from DC to Boulder, CO last summer. Some of you may recall that I was doing some major work on my car prior to the move and I have a lot of pictures, videos, notes and other stuff to post, but I've been slammed with moving and getting settled and finding jobs, etc. I will note that the falcon made the drive without a hitch, even through two 106* days in Kansas. Today, however, I had a nice breakthrough and I thought I should share, expecially for those folks who are using cams like mine and are struggling with smooth idle.
Background: Had an engine built a while back with a 264/274-12* cam and around 10:1 compression (machinist lost his notes so exact compression unknown :roll: ) and a heavily modded log head. Well, this engine's been a PITA, mainly because I've never been able to get it to idle decently, but also because it was short on bottom end power. Had my converter modified by Phoenix Transmission, and that was big help all around, but still she was lumpy.
I'd determined that at around 14* and up of initial things got much better, but my distributor curve would then give me too much total and I'd be in ping city. This engine only tolerates around 32* to 34* total. Send my dizzy to DUI for a recurve with detailed notes and they gave it back to me with 24* at 2700. I guess they don't always listen too well as that forced my max initial to be no more than 10*. I put up with this for a year, fiddling with my carb and doing all possible to enjoy this increasingly expensive POS. But with spring here and the convertible gathering dust, I finally got fed up, took notes and graphed my advance curve and decided to recurve my dizzy myself.
A dig through my parts bin discovered a couple of recurve kits. Careful comparison of the three center plates (advance cams?) i had revealed one that would significantly limit advance, so I installed it with the existing weights. This gave me a total mech advance of 15*, so I set my inital at 17*, my max is 32*. I kept the same springs which come on quick (I'm at 24* at 1500) and voila: 150rpm higher idle (now 700 instead of 550) and power everywhere. Most critically, that 1800 to 2000rpm space that automatics spend so much time at is lively and responsive. And my primary jets which before where too big but where the smallest I could get to work? Now perfect. Oh, and I actually have 9" of vacuum at idle before fiddling with my curb idle settings.
Conclusion: If you are running one of these Clay Smith cams that don't make much vacuum, especially with an automatic, pour on the initial advance. You won't be sorry. Life is good, summer is here, and it is time to go motoring!
Haven't been around here much lately as I picked up the family and moved from DC to Boulder, CO last summer. Some of you may recall that I was doing some major work on my car prior to the move and I have a lot of pictures, videos, notes and other stuff to post, but I've been slammed with moving and getting settled and finding jobs, etc. I will note that the falcon made the drive without a hitch, even through two 106* days in Kansas. Today, however, I had a nice breakthrough and I thought I should share, expecially for those folks who are using cams like mine and are struggling with smooth idle.
Background: Had an engine built a while back with a 264/274-12* cam and around 10:1 compression (machinist lost his notes so exact compression unknown :roll: ) and a heavily modded log head. Well, this engine's been a PITA, mainly because I've never been able to get it to idle decently, but also because it was short on bottom end power. Had my converter modified by Phoenix Transmission, and that was big help all around, but still she was lumpy.
I'd determined that at around 14* and up of initial things got much better, but my distributor curve would then give me too much total and I'd be in ping city. This engine only tolerates around 32* to 34* total. Send my dizzy to DUI for a recurve with detailed notes and they gave it back to me with 24* at 2700. I guess they don't always listen too well as that forced my max initial to be no more than 10*. I put up with this for a year, fiddling with my carb and doing all possible to enjoy this increasingly expensive POS. But with spring here and the convertible gathering dust, I finally got fed up, took notes and graphed my advance curve and decided to recurve my dizzy myself.
A dig through my parts bin discovered a couple of recurve kits. Careful comparison of the three center plates (advance cams?) i had revealed one that would significantly limit advance, so I installed it with the existing weights. This gave me a total mech advance of 15*, so I set my inital at 17*, my max is 32*. I kept the same springs which come on quick (I'm at 24* at 1500) and voila: 150rpm higher idle (now 700 instead of 550) and power everywhere. Most critically, that 1800 to 2000rpm space that automatics spend so much time at is lively and responsive. And my primary jets which before where too big but where the smallest I could get to work? Now perfect. Oh, and I actually have 9" of vacuum at idle before fiddling with my curb idle settings.
Conclusion: If you are running one of these Clay Smith cams that don't make much vacuum, especially with an automatic, pour on the initial advance. You won't be sorry. Life is good, summer is here, and it is time to go motoring!
