she falls on her face at 3500-4000 rpm

[hatepotholez]

i’m having this issue where the car falls on her face at 3500-4000 rpm. plugs, points,wires, cap, condenser are all new. Timing is at about 15-20 degrees at 1100 rpm, I wanted to retard it to 10 degrees or lower but the the dist. has no more range left to turn. Car revs freely under no load. 

any help would be great!

 

thx!

[Mark Maras]

 An assumptions here. The engine doesn't cut out, it just runs out of power under load. I had a similar thing happen years ago. While driving my 240 down the freeway my speed dropped to 45 mph. Kicked in the clutch and revved it to 6 grand. Put it back into third accelerated at full throttle. It wouldn't go past 45 mph. Second gear, same thing. 45 mph was the limit. My Dad knew immediately what it was. Lack of fuel. Mine was corrected (temporarily) by blowing thru the firewall filter in reverse direction. Then a new fuel filter. Hope yours is that easy.

[hatepotholez]

I hope it’s that simple lol! I do have a aftermarket mechanical pump filter is pretty new but I can definitely try another one. 

[hatepotholez]

So we redid the timing chain and all associated parts. Crank to valve timing was off by 15 degrees. Now she revs to 8k when she wants lol. I am still having an issue with it not getting power above 4000. I tried a used electronic distributor and made it worse so I am going back to the old mechanical one and will try a new condenser or temporarily remove it to see what she does. 

[Stanley]

Couple more possibilities:

Dwell not adjusted correctly, or worn points cam. Doubtful since problem occurred with electronic distributor but odd coincidences can happen.

Dirty air cleaner. One of my neighbors had similar problem with Nissan SUV, new air cleaner filter fixed it.  The old one was full of dirt.

[Zed Head]

23 hours ago, hatepotholez said:

So we redid the timing chain and all associated parts. Crank to valve timing was off by 15 degrees. Now she revs to 8k when she wants lol. I am still having an issue with it not getting power above 4000. I tried a used electronic distributor and made it worse so I am going back to the old mechanical one and will try a new condenser or temporarily remove it to see what she does. 

This post says about the same as your first post.  Revs freely but has no power above 4000 RPM.  Don't really see a difference.  

The tachometer needle is a good clue for spark problems.  It's a spark monitor and counter.  Might add some detail to "made it worse".

The condenser in the distributor is there to give a stronger spark and stop the points from burning.

[hatepotholez]

I didn’t have an air filter at all. I can check the dwell and cam lobes I did buy the distributor and pertronix used so who knows. Going to swap the old dizzy in and change the condenser and points .

 

before I couldn’t rev past 4500 at all, now it revs to 8000. after 15 minutes of driving the car started spitting and not going past 4000. i’m leading to beleive the condenser was getting hot and malfunctioning. 

Edited August 29, 2018 by hatepotholez

[Zed Head]

37 minutes ago, hatepotholez said:

after 15 minutes of driving the car started spitting and not going past 4000. i’m leading to beleive the condenser was getting hot and malfunctioning. 

Did it take 15 minutes to get fully warmed up or was it 15 minutes of  driving fully warmed up then it went bad?  Was 15 minutes really 15 minutes?

No offense, but it seems like you're jumping the gun, then shotgunning solutions.  Let things cool down and see if it is heat related and reproducible.  

You didn't answer the question about the tach needle either.  Could be a carb problem.  Good luck.  Make sure you can go back after you make your changes, you might end up making new problems.

 

[hatepotholez]

2 hours ago, Zed Head said:

Did it take 15 minutes to get fully warmed up or was it 15 minutes of  driving fully warmed up then it went bad?  Was 15 minutes really 15 minutes?

No offense, but it seems like you're jumping the gun, then shotgunning solutions.  Let things cool down and see if it is heat related and reproducible.  

You didn't answer the question about the tach needle either.  Could be a carb problem.  Good luck.  Make sure you can go back after you make your changes, you might end up making new problems.

 

Ok, so after we did the complete timing chain and related parts it was running very smooth. It would take timing adjustments and I could actually hear the engine react to the movement of the distributor. We set a baseline timing based on idle and left it for the night. 2 days later we took it for a test run we   got it up to 70 mph, and we drove for a couple of miles for more than 15 minutes on the highway. There was no pinging or spitting.  We pulled over and I drove turned off the car and then 2 minutes later I took it for a spin.  When I started  to drive it I felt the car spitting around 4500 and not going above 5000. I came back home and put in a used dizzy with a used perteonix module. This is when I started having tach issues and loss of power. I came back home and parked it.

 

Today I put in back the old mechanical distributor with new points and new condenser. I also put in a new resistor and coil. I revved the engine hard once and it went to 8k no problem. I did notice my voltage at the battery is 12.5 which I think is low. 

I also noticed the car getting real hot and antifreeze coming out, it is about 101F today and a slight miss from the engine.  Timing is about 5 degrees at idle. 

[Zed Head]

45 minutes ago, hatepotholez said:

I revved the engine hard once and it went to 8k no problem. I did notice my voltage at the battery is 12.5 which I think is low. 

I also noticed the car getting real hot and antifreeze coming out, it is about 101F today and a slight miss from the engine.  Timing is about 5 degrees at idle. 

These engines are tough but I don't think that they're bullet-proof.  The overheating isn't a good sign.  Over-revving can blow head gaskets.

You're way up in the "unless otherwise really necessary" zone.  Danger.

[hatepotholez]

Ya, definitely won't be doing that again lol.