What's the latest thinking on this?
I have an ERA which I bought used and (knowingly) made the classic mistake of buying a vehicle setup for racing to use primarily for city street driving.
I've been slowly correcting this, and think it's time to swap out the MSD ignition for a distributor with vacuum advance.
My goals:
1) Reduce heat
2) Increase gas milage
3) Look more authentic
Earlier in this thread (2014) it was pointed out that MSD is old tech and Pertronix is the new hotness. Is that still the best today? I would love some pointers on what distributor to pair it with. One thing I like about my existing one is the spring loaded screws instead of clips for the cap.
As for the vacuum advance, the cam in this beast is going to be problematic as I'm only pulling around 8"Hg at idle (~800rpm). I need to fiddle with carb a bit still as I discovered yesterday that turning the mixture screws all the way in on the primaries caused the engine to pull the most vacuum (and didn't stall) so it sounds like I need to adjust the throttle plates to expose less slot maybe. This is all new to me, so I'm learning as I go. I pulled the base timing back to 12* prior to this (I think it was closer to 20* when I started w/ 6-7"Hg).
I've read that there are vacuum cans that apply full advance at 8"Hg, though I think I'm going to need to get the manifold vacuum up a bit more than I've been able to thus far before I'll even be able to use one of those, since the cam is so lopey at idle. Also, I haven't been able to find them online.
For the distributor, I think I'm also going to be limited by space given the coolant reservoir encroachment.
Additional engine details:
- 427 SO stroked and bored to 456 I believe.
- Single Holley 1450, 6.5 power valve, Primary jets: 65, Secondary jets: 80.
- MSD 6AL ignition.
- Cam details unknown. Can someone interpret this for me? Looks like 110* lobe separation maybe.
https://imgur.com/gallery/gRsRLKB
Here's a pic of the engine for reference:
https://imgur.com/gallery/28qRAvL
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