Tbi 350 has no power on the road

tayto said:

i have run plenty of late 70s-early 80s 267/305/350 that had "soft" cams. They were just lame, but still ran. ie: not incomplete combustion causing "rich" condition

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Hipster said:

For shyt;s and giggles would verify distibutor in not off a tooth or two. Advancing, etc.

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tayto said:

is your firing order correct and are all cylinders firing? can you smell gas out the tail pipe? if your exhaust smells "rich" it usually means raw fuel which. is incomplete combustion. I am not to sure what your skill level is, usually you can hear if a cam is worn that badly or bad lifters. another easy check is to roll the engine over by hand and see what the valve lift is if you're worried about a worn cam.

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Mitchell93 said:

The distributor was off a tooth when I got it, but it was adjusted enough

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Hipster said:

No. It nas got to be right or advance curves etc are off. Close enough just isn't good enough here. Won't necessarily trigger a misfire code and doesn't mean the spark isn't early or late. It's called distributor phasing . look it up. You just can't drop a distributor in anywhere you like.

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Hipster said:

It's called distibutor phasing . look it up. You just can't drop a distibutor in anywhere you like.

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Schurkey said:

TBI and most previous systems, the distributor can be dropped in anywhere it'll both fit and adjust to the correct initial timing. There was some talk about early ('50s--'60s) distributor housings that would block oil flow to one bank of lifters if it was installed way off of stock--but the ignition timing wouldn't have to be affected.

Not necessarily true for Vortecs. They're picky.

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Schurkey said:

The only bulletin from MSD that I'm aware of covers ROTOR phasing, not "distributor" phasing.

Rotor phasing should be engineered-in by the factory, for factory-style initial timing and timing advance, and with factory-style cam positioning.

Add in cams that get advanced or retarded, and initial timing that may be locked at 35-ish degrees or have the centrifugal/vacuum advance custom-tuned, higher cylinder pressure; and keeping the rotor tip aligned with the distributor cap terminals becomes important enough to tweak to perfection.

Point being, you can drop in "most" distributors on stock or mild engines in any position, any gear mesh you can imagine PROVIDED the distributor will physically fit and turn far enough to achieve proper initial timing...and the engine won't run a bit differently than if it's set to factory spec for position and the same initial timing. Guys screw this up all the time, and either they turn the distributor body 'til it looks like it was crammed-in by a seventh-grader, or folks tell them to move the plug wires over "one terminal" or "four terminals" to correct the timing.

Vortecs are different.

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