Ol John Lee gets a tune up

[Sharps40]

If you have a trusted mechanic, don't grudge him an extra hours charge to properly install plug wires. What a job. They start out clean and grey and finish up greasy and black when routed properly thru the motormounts, pan clips and up thru the wire separaters to the distributer. Passenger side bank takes the longest but at least the old Pacard wires matched up in length to the new replacments and so I laid them out on the floor and replaced them one at a time so I don't have to figure out which cylinder number goes with which cap socket...too much spacial displacment for me, just pull and replace, times 9 till done.



One at a time thats the ticket....



These two wern't doin me or Ol John Lee much good....



I expected the old plugs to be badly coked up and they were at one time. But near 6000 miles of steady driving since December 11 and some good ol fashioned ear tuneing and they for the most part burned clean and light brown on the electrodes and insulators. First and last cylinder on the drivers side had coked plugs that just couldn't burn clean so, good time to have replaced them. I suspect with the slight miss in the engine, these two cylinders prolly have the leakey valves.



But on the passenger bank, (where those two bad wires were located) all is well and the old plugs had burnt themselves clean of the coke and all light brown where it counts. So, carb must be adjusted pretty close to correct. Time tomorrow for range trip and then some break adjustments for the long ride to SC for hunting in Sept. Maybe, theres time to swap out the distributer guts and do a good retime and points adjust, but then, maybe I'll just keep drivin since its driving kinda okay.

[Sharps40]

Huge thanks to Bigten over on NC Hunt and Fish,

Another huge thanks for all the advice here too, my first full points ignition type tune up since 1994. As you are aware I recently replaced the carb, wires and plugs (gapped 36 thousands). Much improvement in driveability. However, I'd noticed rough hot and cold idle persisted as well as some stuttering in the engine prior to acheiving the top RPM range in each gear. Ol John Lee couldn't get out of his own way on a hill and most hills needed a downshift to 2nd gear if under 45 mph.

So, sold some brass and treated myself to a tach/dwell meter and a timeing light. Ya have no idea how hard they are to find now. Mine are now to be treated like gold. But remembering there is a direct relationship between dwell angle and timeing (one way, dwell changes time...time changes do not change dwell) i checked the hot settings first.

Dwell was 20 degrees (28 to 32 required) and timeing was 4 degrees before top dead center.

I readjusted the dwell setting, hot at 575 rpm to 28 degrees. Timeing was then checked and had retarded to TDC. Resetting the idle from its new setting of 625 rpm back to 575, dwell remained at 28 and timeing remained at TDC.

I then reset the timeing (distributor clamp was no where near tight enough, prolly why it slipped so much over the last few months) to 4 degrees advance. Idle went back up to 600 and dwell remained 28 degrees.

I reset the idle to 575 and proceded to lean the right barrel and watched the RPM rise to 650 then fall off at 2 3/4 turns lean...I backed the right barrel off 1/4 turn and the RPM advanced to 650.

Did the same procedure on the left barrel and set it at very nearly the same location, about 2 3/4 turns lean.

Finished up by resetting the curb hot idle to 575 smooth and quiet RPM.

The test ride was AWESOME!!!!! Power, like a small block should have. Smooth idle. Smooth and quick transition from idle to gear and no lean pinging no matter how I lugged it in third. I can pull the hill out of the house in third at 15 mph w/o lugging! There is no flutter in the engine regardless of load or RPM. The hot restart is instantaneous.

We'll have to check the cold starts tomorrow with a trip to work, but for the first time, me and Ol John Lee went 70 mph and the engine felt like it was very comfortable over 60 mph for the first time.

I predict success! Thanks.

[Sharps40]

Success was a blown clutch plate 24 hours later...too much real power and not enough faceing! So, shop put the new clutch in and me and Ol John Lee motored to the Low Countery of SC and shot some deer. Average highway mileage on that trip was 18.21 mpg highway down and back and 15.5 mpg around town. I couldn't be more pleased with the new carb (Rochester 2g reman) and the home tune up.

[Sharps40]

Back when I originally posted this thread I was replacin plug and stuff that had been on the truck long before its 5 year sit in the garage till I traded for it. Over the holidays in December of last year I swapped out the leaky intake manifold gaskets to solve one of several ongoing oil leaks, separate thread and a great adventure in oil wasted. But, got that leak sealed and broke on of my rules in the process. I sorta fiddled with the timeing and dwell and carb settings when the engine was still cold....just hasn't been runnin the best since December and all through the suspension overhaul and the brake modifications.

I think the best $40 I ever spent on ebay was for two copies of Motor manual. One from 1967 covering all makes and one for 1964 Trucks. Tryin to figure why I had a miss pulling in gear and climbing hills and here in the last two days, a loss of that good 283 power going up hill with the miss getting worse. Idle was just fine. Figured it was fuel or tune since I'd messed with it cold so spent a good hour with Ol John Lee tonight.

Started with the obvious, checked timeing, dwell, idle speed and choke all hot and all good. Checked the coil and wire connections, even clamp on the dizzy, all good. A quick test ride and I still had that miss on acceleration and up hills in high.

So, back under the hood and really fine tuned the idle mixture and a slight tweek of the idle speed and the pedal linkage. A bit better on the test ride but still not perfect like back when I did the tune up above......

Thought a bit and I remembered those fouled plugs in Cylinders 1 and 7. Grabbed the 1968 Motors manual and went straight to trouble shooting where it stated a common failing for miss (acceleration and pulling) was a fouled plug.

Yanked out numbers 1 and 7 and sure enough, Carbon Mushrooms growing on the electrods. The gap nearly covered in carbon. So, cleaned em out with a pick, set the gaps and run them back in. Checked the other six and they are all light brown and fine as frog hairs.

The final test ride? All that smooth power is back on tap with nairy a miss even pulling in third from 10 mph. Very nice. I spose the lesson is, listen to what yer truck is sayin. This one was easy. Actually shoulda been a no brainer. With a tired motor I really oughta be cleaning the plugs on a pretty regular basis, but been havin so much fun ridin....

[MikeS.]

Gotta say I love your posts. Not only well written but informative. With a 283 in my Burb you've given me a lot of things to watch for.

Thanks
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[Sharps40]

Thanks, I figure might as well write it down, someone else is gonna have similar problems one day. I remember startin out at 16 with a 1948 Dodge and doin a lot of head scratchin and chasein ideas and wish there was someone around to day, "Nah, its easy, yer plugs are fouled or that fine lil wire on the distributer breaker plate is broke." Woulda ment more drivin time lookin coolski!