I suppose I buy a timing sticker that goes on the balancer, run the car at 200 or 500 RPM intervals up until I get the total timing RPM, and write down each interval. What am I shooting for...for a good timing curve? All in at 3000? As long as its all in at 3000, why do I care about the other timing up to that point? just need a good leson here.

First off, I would make sure your mechanical advance is clean and working properly. Make sure the weights don't hang up. Also, those timing tapes tend to disapper quickly. I would start with taking a paint pen and marking your balancer at 5* intervals (using the timing tape). That way you have a more permanent timing reference. This worked well for me.

When I did mine, I checked to see when my mechanical advance was done advancing ("all-in"). I was "all-in" at 4600 with my factory HEI :eek: I brought mine all-in by 2500 RPM on my low compression 400. For a reference point, on my new HEI for my 383 (from D.U.I.) they curved it to be "all-in" at 3000 RPM (10:1 CR, XE274 cam).

I also noted how much mechanical advance I had. In my case, I had about 24*. So, with 10 to 12 degrees of initial & it worked well - and this gave me 34 to 36* of total timing.

I dunno if there are other ways to do this. If so, I want to here them...

Timing needs to be brought in smoothly otherwise you can have driveablity issues. So, if you graph out a timing curve that starts to come in at around 1200 and ends at 3000 the curve shape will look like like a smooth slope up betweeen the points.

Go into the MSD site and look up install instructions for say a 85561 billet distributor. In the instructions they will have charts of various ignition curves based on spring weights. It will be perfectly clear after you look at the visual.

So you prefer example C with a black bushing?

http://www.msdignition.com/pdf/85561_8547_85501_frm25672.pdf

I had to also change out the advance stop bushing on mine. I am using the silver springs (bring in timing fast) with the silver stop bushing to limit 25*. I may go to the blue stop bushing as I have a little too much timing on top right now.

More fine tuning to come.

I have a MSD with no vacuum advance.

I use the E setup on a typical application with the silver bushing. Gets your timing all in at 3000 and with that bushing you will have 35 to 37 advance with base timing in the 10 to 12 BTDC range. With vacuum advance hooked to manifold you should see 18 to 20 at idle.

If you don't have vacuum advance then yes, you'll be looking at version C. You can try the spring combo in version E which will bring the advance in sooner but watch out for detonation. It may be more responsive with the E combo springs without the vac advance.