272 cam + auto-tranny = High stall torque converter?

The Pertronix II is not in yet, but I will keep those tips in mind.

As for the distributor, from what I have been reading it seems that the newer unit with mechanical advance is to help with acceleration because the big cam will cause low vacuum on acceleration. The vacuum should be better at idle, right?

That is why I was thinking that the first step would be to tune the carb for best idle and in gear idle. After that, working on the dizzy issues would be the next priority. The questions is, should I set the timing before I add the Pertronix or after?

Am I on the right track?

this is often a problem with longer duration cams. the power valve drops open due to lack of vacuum. richens it up too much. so it loads up and stumbles to a halt. go to a lower value power valve. or in some cases it is plugged completely if there are other circuits which will cover.

forget the loose converter that will kill your mileage.

dont know if this works on these carbs but i had a similar experience on a holley/weber on a vw with a big cam. we ended up drilling a .050 extra hole in the throttle plate to lean out the idle; it moved the relative position of the butterfly to the idle and transfer port.

just some more ideas to chew on. frankie

Okay... Sorry about the long delay, but I finally got my hands on my dad's old tuneup tools.

For starters, I pulled the vacuum line from the base of the carb and threw a vacuum gauge on there. Now, the engine was not completely warm and the idle was swinging pretty radically, but the vacuum was reading between 8 - 13 (8 on the low end of the swing, 13 on the higher end).

Now, when I pulled the vacuum line I didn't seem to notice that much difference in the way it was running. However, it would not start with the line removed.

I also pulled the #1 plug and it wasn't as bad as I thought. I expected it to be really sooty, but it didn't look to bad to me. I'll try and get some pictures up in the next day or two.

Still having a hard time getting the RPMs for you guys to give you more info. My interior tach is shot. I did find a old Craftsman Dwell, Volts & RPM gauge mixed in with his tools, but I wasn't sure where to hook this up to. It has two leads. A wide green alligator clip and a narrow black aligator clip.

Anyone know where I hook this up to?