idle speed and stalling question

[big_rig]

I just finished up my little project in time for the weekend. I put on my newly rebuilt and machined head off of a 194, offy intake, heddman headers, edelbrock 1405 and shiny new chrome air cleaner. I read up around here and some other forums on tuning the carb with a vacuum gauge and got about 18"Hg at an idle of around 650 rpm. It runs smooth and sounds good in the shop but when I went for a test drive, it wants to stall when I stop. Does anyone have any idea where my idle speed should be? Am I too low for the carb to catch up coming back down? Any info would be great as this was my first time doing any work with a 4 barrel carb.

[geezer#99]

What distributor?
What's your timing set at?
Stalling can be timing related.

[maxwoof]

I agree with the above. If the timing is set too far in advance, you really have to back off on the idle screw to bring the rpms down. Butterflies are mostly closed.

Also, I had an old carb that would stall sometimes. The throttle shafts were so loose that the butterfly would close in a different place all the time. Could not keep a consistent idle.