Time for the typical newbie timing question....

Kind of had to to shut up the vac advance guru's. I just did one of the E advance ones also to see if my rebuilder can do them. No way I can get those rebuilt and when they are gone they are gone. There is a lot of myths out there on them. Best one I love is when they sell it as low vacuum operation for a ton of money. They are just Standards with the screw turned in all the way. Not really lying either it does do that. Wish I came up with that one. Basically if you can fit a 3/32 Allen key in the nipple it is adjustable for when to start to activate. I have done a few as low as 7 INHG. Not to many require that. But most need to be adjusted to work for your curve.
 
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@Steve-o
Perfect! this is EXACTLY all the info I needed. I have a timing light with advance function and tach so that's why I was asking what full advance should be. I guess my thought is I'm not driving around at idle and because my background is mostly air cooled engines, full advance timing is critical....where as here it is more of a play by ear it seems.

The distributor was rebuilt by halifaxhops and was run and tuned on a Sun distributor machine before sending to me.
I really shouldn't have to mess with the vacuum pod I hope. I'll play with it tomorrow and report back.
Thanks!
Curious. So how'd it go? Ben
 
So when I initially put in the distributor I advanced it to where I thought the idle should be and then backed it off some. Put the timing light on it and was 35° advance at idle. Had some mega low end power off a dead start that's for sure. (like throw you in the back seat) Pinging like a **** though. So now thanks to everyone's suggestions I was able to understand what's actually going on here. VERY clever that you can tune the vacuum pod to your engine. VW doesn't do that, let alone run worth a crap at 35° advance at idle. This engine is very forgiving at how it runs.

Backed the timing down to 12° at idle (no vacuum hooked up) Drove it around and much better at no pinging but it could have some more lower end. I believe I'll have to play with the vacuum because the carb is a Holley 2 barrel. Not the stock carb for that year. Different vacuum signal amount I'm guessing. Now that I know what I'm after, should be a slam dunk. Tuning the mid range is genius.

I have been doing other things to the car to get it inspected and my 68 Texas plates on it. Mostly all electrical.
had to make a new taillight harness for the entire right side of he car and license light. Fix the reverse lights and the hazards. Thanks to this forum the reverse light thing was pretty easy. Clean and realign the contact.

So the timing thing has taken a back seat until i can actually have daylight again to work on it. F day light savings...
 
Air cooled. Hmm, what air cooled engine? So did you switch from a Volkswagen Beetle to Mopar? Or maybe from a Corvair?
It is VW air cooled. I've been messing with VW since I was 18. Built (not had built for me) several show cars for myself and other people, several hit the magazines. Just burnt out I guess. I've always loved the style of 60's American cars and had been looking for a few months for the "right" car. Would have loved a 67-68 cougar or a 60's Lincoln, but I dont have that kind of money. This came along and I didnt even know it's what I wanted until I saw it. Sexy **** for sure. I still have 5 VW's and will always have at least one. My single cab.
 
I have been doing other things to the car to get it inspected and my 68 Texas plates on it. Mostly all electrical. Had to make a new taillight harness for the entire right side of he car and license light. Fix the reverse lights and the hazards. Thanks to this forum the reverse light thing was pretty easy. Clean and realign the contact.
So the timing thing has taken a back seat until i can actually have daylight again to work on it. F day light savings...
It's always something. Car plans are made to be broken.
 
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