Well, after two pulls this season, I regret to report the winner's circle has not been occupied by the buzzing little flathead. The competition has stiffened with some pretty sturdy OHV's really turning it up on the rpm's. Although the crown as to who can hit the highest digit on the tach still belongs to the lil' 230, the cubes are getting ahead of the Custom. I guess you can say the bar has been raised.
I do have the combination for the Petronix upgrade. It requires Petronix kit #1562. The spark plate adapter bolts right in, but the distributor shaft will need to be modified by shortening the point cam down .125" as measured from the top. The distributor shaft can be taken out and chucked up in a lathe to cut the point cam by the amount needed to align the magnets on the shaft with the pickups.
The rotor button also does not match. The top half of the Petronix rotor will have to be cut off and a stock rotor button matched and glued to the Petronix bottom half. This is the modification I was most skeptical of, but its worked for two years at 5000+ rpms without a bobble.
This has proven to be a reliable setup without a single service failure in the time it has been running. The real criticism is the lack of timing advance/retard capability due to the limited range of the magnetic pickup. The maximum advance is 16 degrees.
The Custom may not be dead in the water as far as competition goes. Dad is working over some tire changes and perhaps a little weight distribution change or two. There is a bone stock 292 chevy and a cross flow, 12 port waukeshau 312 really putting on a show right now at the track. Its gonna be tough.
Hudson
