[ronk455]

In the fall of last year, I replaced the motor in my 62 Tempest. The motor that was in the car had severe blow-by. I purchased another motor from a Little Indians Club member. I replaced the timing chain and gears, oil pump, water pump and used the head from my original motor. The head had previously been gone over as a result of a wayward nut dropped down the carburetor. (The reason for the motor change). I have dis-assembled and cleaned the carb. Bought a rebuild kit and re-assembled. All of the original wiring was shot, so out it came. I bought a universal wiring harness and rewired the whole car. The distributor has been taken apart, cleaned, lubed and put back together. Now that the weather is getting warm, I have been trying to get the car road worthy. The first thing I did was set the dwell to 75 degrees, set the timing to 6 BTDC with the advance unplugged and the vacuum port on the manifold plugged. I can set the choke, pump the pedal a few times and the car will start right up and idle at 650 RPM's. I have 20 inches of vacuum at idle, reading it at the "T" fitting in the manifold where the advance is hooked up to. After letting it warm up, the choke will open ok. Car idles nice in neutral. As soon as I place it in gear, I have to keep one foot on the brake and use the other to keep feathering the gas to keep it running. I thought maybe the balancer had slipped, so pulled #1 plug, rotated the motor over by hand. When looking in the cylinder, I can see the piston at the top when the marks on the balancer are at the timing pointer. This has the early style (large cast iron) distributor in it. I have replaced the points, condenser, cap and rotor. Checked the vacuum advance with a Mity Vac to make sure the diaphram was ok. I am looking for some help to get this thing going. Where do I go next???

[mechanickeith]

Where do you have the idle fuel jet at?? I usually start with it 1.5 turns out & adjust from there. Also, the factory idle settings are a bit low for my liking. Set it at 800 & see how it acts.

[Sirrotica]

Looking at tune up specs there are 2 settings for dwell in 62 distributors depending upon which distributor it is could be 75 or 30.

http://www.tpocr.com/pontiac.html

[63Banshee]

Originally Posted by mechanickeith

I usually start with it 1.5 turns out & adjust from there. Also, the factory idle settings are a bit low for my liking. Set it at 800 & see how it acts.

x 2

[azkeebler]

I'm betting on vacuum leak at or in vacuum modulator at tranny if auto (assuming it is as you state,put in gear).

Also noticed the modern carb kits have thin base to body gaskets that don't seal well and result in leaks.

You can't always rely on the dwell meter you are using. Seems like the older ones are more accurate than the newer ones. I couldn't get my blue car right until my neighbor gave me an oldie. The readings were completely different and now the car purrs.

[ronk455]

Got a chance to work on the car some last night. I started out by setting the adjustment on the idle mixture screw. 1 and a half turns out from seated. Started car up and let it warm up. Checked idle speed again. Using vacuum gauge adjusted idle mixture to get the highest reading on the gauge. (Didn't need very much adj). Then went and set idle speed to 800 RPM's in Neutral. As soon as I placed the trans in drive, same thing. Couldn't keep it running without 1 foot on brake and the other on the gas. I figured it was time to play with the timing. Loosened bolt with the car running, only to watch the dist move on its own! Dang-it, too loose. Car shut off by itself. Tightened up bolt and tried to restart. I had my son crank it while I turned dist by hand. Got it fired right up. Didn't even bother to get out the timing light this time. Set it by ear. Got back in the car, placed it in drive, and it sat there and idled without touching the gas pedal. Took it for a drive up the street. This was the first time since I have had the car, I didn't need my hand on the trans selector lever to keep putting it in neutral to keep running. I have not had a chance to check the vacuum modulator on the trans yet.

Now on the the next issue. Now that the car is going over 15mph. The speedo needle is sticking after about 25mph. It will come back down if I put it in reverse and back up. I put a new speedo cable in it last year when I was putting it back together. I really don't feel like pulling the cluster back out right now. Any ideas on a fix??

Also, how hard is it to rebuild the manual steering box? There is a lot of slop in the steering wheel. I have tried to adj with the adjusting screw and locknut on the top.