turns out the main problem or atleast the only thing that helped... anyway was that I had one plug wire only making contact with the plug because of the boot holding it on another one came apart when I tried to pull the wire off of the plug... fixed that had one plug with cracked porcelain, than I set the timing to 5 degrees advanced... I don't know how low I should go... I just keep nocking it down until the detonation goes away... ok... my current status is that the backfireing which by the way is out the pipes, is once in a great while... I still have abit of detonation expecially under load and under medium to heavy acceloration... If I just floor it and really open all 4 barrels it usually stops detonating... just a little above cruise is the worst though... anyway I do have a carb jet kit and have played with it abit but I still can't find something that would tell me what to change on the carb to change certain behavior of the engine. anyway. got to go.
Fire out the pipes means it running pig rich and/or not all of the holes are firing. I don't know what the technical name for that is. Post combustion or something I guess. An actual back fire is when you chase a flame up into the intake and catch all that gas and air on fire. This will give you the infamous "holley haircut" if you're leaning over an open carb when this happens. Nitrous backfires are the best, because they're HUUUUUGE.
Yeah thats not a backfire. Gas is igniting insided your pipes. Check and make sure all your wires are good, and if all your spark plugs have good spark a spark can get blown out if its not strong enough. Do you smell un burnt gas when it does this or does your exhuast smell really rich. 10 degrees is pretty safe place for your timing, but differnt cams and degrees of cams can change this. You could also have a exhaust valve getting stuck open alittle, do a compression test see what your numbers are and if any one is abnormaly low. Again start at the simplest thing and go from there. Ive seem bad valve ajustment do this.
Ok... now the major problem is pinging... if I had it retarded to much cause it??? every time I adjust my timing it's ok for a while, but after driving afew miles it starts pinging... I was getting arcing a little and I remadied that. I've decided to turn my timing up from 5 degrees to 6 again... should I try driving with the vacume advance disconnected and pluged? I assume there is a mechanical advance as well on a vacume distributer... I've had the distributer on there for about 3 1/2 years is it time to replace it? sorry alot of questions.... this whole sisuation is really getting to me...
You might have heavy carbon buildup which can cause the pre-ignition / pinging. What temp thermostat are you running? Which grade of fuel are you using? Does your area require reformulated gasoline? You may just have to step up a grade. If you set your timing and drive the car and come back and check the timing again is it the same or has it moved?
I replaced the plugs last weekend. I use 91 octane gas. I shouldn't have to step up the gas or use special formulation because it's a 9:1 ot 9.5:1 compression. It doesn't get any higher than 230F and if I'm driving well and not stuck in stop and go traffic it's around 200F or a little less. The timing seems to stay where I set it... with the vacume disconnected and plugged.
Disconnected the timing advance today and it ran alot better. maybe my vacume advance is going bad... spring getting weak or something. Don't know if I should just leave it off or what...
