HELP!?! Project Stalled

[skink4president]

Just finished a half-dozen small bolt on projects on my '73 K5 (350) and now it wont start. New carb, fuel pump, distributor, dampner, oil pump and intake. Engine cranks, has spark and the carb is getting gas. I TDCed the engine when installing the new (HEI) distributor and set the rotor at approx. the #1 post. Tried retarding and advancing the timing by quite a lot but still nothing. Enigne just cranks and eventually backfires gas out the carb?!?

Can my intial timing be THAT far off? I used a soft plastic straw in the #1 cylinder's spark plug hole to determine when the piston hit TDC and it seemed to line up almost perfectly with the TDC mark on the new Dampner. Carb is a brand new Edelbrock squarebore #1400.

Going nuts here and any advice would be helpful

 

[1979jimmy350]

make sure that you are on TDC of the compression stroke because if you only check for the postion of the pistion you could be on the top of the exaust stroke which will make your timing way off

 

[skink4president]

Thanks Man! You hit it right on the head! Stupid mistake on my part. Of course it was a 50-50 shot that the TDC I chose was exhaust so luck wasn't on my side either.

Any recommendations onsetting the timing? I think the factory calls for 8 degrees or so but even with a stock cam that seems real low.

Thanks again!

 

[RustBuket]

I set my 305 to 10 degrees and it ran nice.

 

[theperfectgarage]

timing

Inital timing depends on a few factors ( like elevation, octain etc.) At 6000 ft elevation I ran 14 deg. with the same truck at 2000 ft. I set it at 10 deg. Experiment a bit but PAY ATTENTION ! Listen to that engine under load, too much timing can be a VERY bad thing. If your engine seems to " fight" the starter on hot starts, your probably too far advanced. Good luck.