FE Misfire

[Bruce Botti]

Thanks for the help!

Wilf, it is mechanical advance only.

Chopper, I tried a few things:
1. Checked the vacuum, and I only had 10" at idle. I changed the gaskets on the carb-turkey pan-manifold from thin paper to Mr Gasket (thicker material) ones. Haven't checked it yet (see #2).

2. I pulled all the plugs and they were all light brown except for #3 and 4 which were dark and wet. Checked the compression and all cylinders are 135-150. A few of the ends came off the wires, and a few of the boots were deteriorating. I called Southern Auto and they said that they would send out a new set that day (thats what I call service).

3. After you mentioned an exhaust leak, I paid close attention and noticed an area where the header gasket was leaking. I changed to a higher grade gasket. Whew, what a job! It took about 6 hours. I thought all I would have to do was take out a few bolts, loosen up the others and then reinsert the new gasket. This would have been fine except that the gasket was stuck to the block. This is with only 35 miles on it. That necessitated taking off the side pipes and removing all the header bolts. What a job getting in there and scraping since you couldn't even move the headers more than an inch or so. I'll start it as soon as I get the new wires.

Bruce