Don't get me wrong, I love working on this piece of stone age cast iron... and I get a tremendous amount of satisfaction from learning. Even the hard lessons are valuable and interesting.
I know there is more power under one rock or another, I just want to keep flipping rocks over to find them. At the end it will be a combination of many things like you said, I doubt there's any ONE thing that would make me think all the other mods were useless and I should have only done THIS and ignored the rest.
So far the most noticeable difference has probably been the HEI distributor. I was going to go with an MSD box and already had a pertronix conversion in the old stock distributor (which steadied the timing tremendously), but I knew I had a worn distributor... with a curve best suited for farm equipment.
I can hear a positive difference in the exhaust note, its starting to sound more like the tiny 4 bangers when tuned up, the pressure is there, but the power (flow, breathing ability) is not. There is a narrow rpm band and speed combo where the car really performs well, but it doesn't take long to fall out of the optimum window. Its like it chokes just as it starts to feel like it wants to go fast.
Mixture is set a little rich but its consistent all the way through. IF THIS WAS one of those engines I know better, I would definitely do induction and exhaust next...
And that is the plan. Just looking at the numbers it seems way under carbed. At first start with a 2bbl on a stock, modified intake, and Langdon headers, dual pipes. Again I am expecting a noticeable difference, but we'll see. I don't want to jump straight to a 4bbl, the "known good" solution. Then I wouldn't learn anything about fitting a 2bbl on it.
As it is, it's very driveable and I am enjoying driving it again. Its soothing, relaxing, and the exhaust pipe plays a tune much more satisfying than the radio ever could
