Slanted timing issues

When I thought about it some more, I realized that the vacuum can was not the real problem. There's a plate that bolts to the underside of the distributor, with a slot that the timing lock bolt goes through. When we got the engine as smooth as we could, our timing mark was just about straight up, quite a way away from the tab on the engine and we had the lock bolt out, because that slot wouldn't let us turn the dist far enough.

A response I got on another forum said that: "Some aftermarket dist. pick-ups are wired backwards and cause the ign. to fire 20-30 degrees off from the correct phasing."

Then I found this on the MSD Ignition site: "Not sure about the polarity of the pickup you are using? Test by checking the engine's timing. Check the timing with the pickup wires connected one way, then swap the wires and check the timing again. You will notice that the timing changes significantly and may appear very erratic. The correct connection depends on the ignition control that you are using."

and, also from MSD "Chrysler pickup leads should be Orange/White
for positive and black for negative."

I think we're closing in on it!

ATB

BC