My fellow mopar friends, I am trying to dial in the timing on my 79. I searched the forums and found a lot on the 318 but nothing for a 360 of this age. It's a California van with all the functioning smog equipment on it and I'm just trying to determine the timing requirements for base timing. The hood on my van is not the stock hood, and it has stickers for a slant 6 so I cant reference those numbers any more.
I put a new distributor on it, after the existing one broke. It went in the same way it came out, rotor in the same position, etc. But when I clocked it to the same position it was in for timing, it did not start. I rotated it clockwise until I got it to start (lets say the vacuum can was at 1 o clock and now its at 2-2:30), so it runs and drives ok, but I want to understand what the timing numbers should be and I want to understand why in the same position, it would not start or run at all. The distributor with the key slot at the bottom allows it to go in only two ways, and I made sure the #1 is pointing at number one and the rotor was in the same exact position. Being that it runs, I know its not 180 out, but just was surprised to find the timing position is different.
I am not going to mess with the smog stuff at the moment but I would assume that base timing is different for a motor with smog and a motor without smog. Is that a correct assumption? I feel like a lot that I see online is non smog stuff. for like 10-12 degrees base timing, some sources say 5 degrees.
Thank you for any help.
