FYI: 1968 Distributor Advance Centrifical Weights

[Anonymous]

Over the past few weeks I have been problem solving the "sputter" at low speed/RPM's found on my '68 stock 200. I have researched quite a bit about the '68 FoMoCo Distributor/Carb set-ups for that year. With the help of this forum and some great FoMoCo Obsolete part suppliers and the '68 Shop Manual, I have found part of the problem. I want to share this info with my fellow '68 sixers to help spare them the headache I have had...

In addition to the mismatched pre-68 carb (spark control valve) and '68 dual advance distributor, requiring no SCV, I also found that the centrifical weights on the ORIGINAL AUTOLITE distributor cam were 18/13 (A/T and M/T cars) with the 13 on the stop. On the two Motorcraft, A1Cardone rebuilds I have used, both the weights were 10/15 with the 10 on the stop.

I bought a NOS Ford rebuilt using the original Ford Part number and the weights were the original 18/13.

Although this does not have anything to do with my low speed RPM issues, it did affect my total advance numbers and high RPM operation. Although the advance curve can be manipulated by only the initial and vacuum advance to compensate for the lesser centrifical advance, I thought I would point it out for informational value.


I hope this helps!

Jay

 

[Anonymous]

Thanks Jay,
I have noticed that the unit I bought from A-1 Cardone does not have much centrifugal advance. now I will have to tear into it and see if it has the light weights.
Doug

 

[addo]

This is quite interesting. I'm thinking of Sedanman's dizzy issues, particularly.

 

[Anonymous]

Well I finally tore into my Cardone Distributor for a '68 this weekend. I too found the 15/10 deg centrifugal advance stops with it set on the 10 deg (distributor) stop. Previously, I was only getting about 14 deg (crankshaft) advance at 3000 rpm and was running 18 deg initial. That gave me about 32 deg at WOT. The 10 deg stop should allow 20 deg of crank advance. But there were two different centrifugal weight springs on the rebuilt distributor, one of which was very heavy. The other spring looked very similar to a medium weight HEI distributor spring. The combination yielded a slow advance curve that was not all the way in at 3000 rpm.

I flipped over the centrifugal advance stop to 15 deg and replaced the heavy spring with a lighter medium weight spring from an HEI distributor kit. The andvance stop was connected to the distributor rotor post. So when I flipped the advance stop to the 15 deg setting I had to pull out the distributor and re-index it to fire correctly. Flipping the weight changes the firing order by 180 degrees.

Fired it up and I was getting about 45 deg of advance at 3000 rpm (vac line plugged). I reset the initial timing to 10 deg and am now getting about 35 deg total advance at WOT. The lighter springs are allowing the centrifugal advance to come in much quicker, and I am getting about 25 deg of centrifugal advance by 2500 rpm. I was also able to add a couple of more degrees to the vacuum advance at idle. Next week I may map out the curve since I only did a couple of spot checks this week. Thanks to Jay for posting the info on the Cardone distributor.
Doug

 

[Anonymous]

Hey Doug!

Glad my headache was able to help you out!

Ever since I changed the 1100 over to the non-SCV carb and dialed in the right advance numbers, she has been running great.

Jay