[blykins]

I think I just figured out my question about the timing gears....when you time an engine, you keep the dots pointing to each other...if you want to retard the cam timing, you would then turn the crank so that the key would line up with the keyway on the 4 deg retard mark. So in essence, instead of rotating the crank CCW to retard it, you're moving it CW.

Tada.