help solve my sputtering problem!

[S Bramlitt]

If you have access to compressed air, it is quite easy to place duct tape over the exhaust exit and put a blow gun in the tape and pressurize the exhaust to look for leaks. Get a bottle of soapy water that you can squirt around the head pipe gaskets, header flanges, etc. I use this technique checking for leaks around oxygen sensors on fuel injected cars.

As far as the sputtering? I'd almost guarantee its fuel delivery. I would take the recommendation of simply placing a know good carb on it and see if your problem goes away.

[lnfletcher]

I was going by the following site on reading the plug. Mine looks pretty much like the first example. "brown or light gray".
http://www.ngksparkplugs.com/tech_su...qs/faqread.asp

I'm trying another Carb tonight. Should eliminate this possiblity.
Also, I may have not mentioned that the backfiring is out of both exhaust and really doesn't take "hard" engine braking, just moderate.

[lnfletcher]

Ok! Problem found.
It was the distributor, more specifically, the pickup.
I think God was on my side though because when I pulled the dist to install the new one, it was extremely hard to turn. This I believe is because the gear to shoulder measurement was out.(to long) This is a new dist that I bought last year and have run it about 800 miles. The only reason I know it was off is because when I had to replace the iron gear with steel on the new MSD unit, it had the min/max measurements for the spacing. I assume, it was heating up the shaft and caused the pickup to fail. (much cheaper than a cam being destroyed!)

Thanks for all the help, I'm sure I'll need more in the future!