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I have found the parts from Paragon to be superior.
Out of curiosity, do you use a high volume oil pump?
Car is base 72 350 I doubt it has a HV pump. However, not sure what previous owner has done with this motor. Nothing I have found on it would have suggested otherwise.
Car is base 72 350 I doubt it has a HV pump. However, not sure what previous owner has done with this motor. Nothing I have found on it would have suggested otherwise.
dist shafts get dirty and block oil on the shaft.
you are lucky it didn't snap at some early point.
good to know someone sells shafts.
swap over your weights and springs
Rick, there are a few suppliers. Paragon stuff works well. I believe someone else makes them, but I do not know who. Mid America has shafts, but the cam is indexed incorrectly.
There may be others, but NOS stuff is best. Expensive, but some people request them.
The last NOS GM TI HP shaft I bought was $180.
Rick, there are a few suppliers. Paragon stuff works well. I believe someone else makes them, but I do not know who. Mid America has shafts, but the cam is indexed incorrectly.
There may be others, but NOS stuff is best. Expensive, but some people request them.
The last NOS GM TI HP shaft I bought was $180.
not surprised,
that is what i thought.
i was able to save one from a 70 350 by the skin of my nose.
even bought a rebuilt from a parts house.
last i looked there a 4 service replacements, generic dist,
avail.
to all who need a dist.... use your original weights and springs, make note the vacuum can and get the right one for your car
not surprised,
that is what i thought.
i was able to save one from a 70 350 by the skin of my nose.
even bought a rebuilt from a parts house.
last i looked there a 4 service replacements, generic dist,
avail.
to all who need a dist.... use your original weights and springs, make note the vacuum can and get the right one for your car
HUH? Original springs? You mean you want all the advance in at 5,500 RPMs?
HUH? Original springs? You mean you want all the advance in at 5,500 RPMs?
where did i say anything like that?
a persons distributor is unique by weights and springs.
whether that is oe or been curved to engine during
rebuild.
to expect an off the shelf dist will have the same curve is
crazy.
weights, springs, vac can are the things that
make the dist correct.
just like an oe carb
expecting an off the shelf carb to be proper is also crazy.
they may work but are not vorrect
My car hasn't been running too good. Maybe this is why.. Where is everyone buying replacement parts from?
Be aware that your biggest problem will be with the worn crossgear thrust surface in the distributor housing - you didn't take picture of that. You have to do a machine repair of that surface, and you will need to machine a custom thrust surface insert to repair it. If you don't do that, your new mainshaft will strip out and destroy the lower haft bushing again due to the crossgear seizing up and shelling out.
Be aware that your biggest problem will be with the worn crossgear thrust surface in the distributor housing - you didn't take picture of that. You have to do a machine repair of that surface, and you will need to machine a custom thrust surface insert to repair it. If you don't do that, your new mainshaft will strip out and destroy the lower haft bushing again due to the crossgear seizing up and shelling out.
You can't use the nylon button in your distributor - it's not set up for it. You have to have the thrust surface machined, and then a custom thrust surface insert needs to be fabricated and installed into the housing. That's how I fix them. You're going to get suggestions to drill and tap a hole through your housing and install a screw to act as an adjustable thrust surface. This tapped hole will be all crooked, and will cause rapid wear of your crossgear and continuous failures of the tach drive system, so don't do it...
You're also going to need new bushings, which means that they will need to be align honed to fit your new shaft.
You can't use the nylon button in your distributor - it's not set up for it. You have to have the thrust surface machined, and then a custom thrust surface insert needs to be fabricated and installed into the housing. That's how I fix them. You're going to get suggestions to drill and tap a hole through your housing and install a screw to act as an adjustable thrust surface. This tapped hole will be all crooked, and will cause rapid wear of your crossgear and continuous failures of the tach drive system, so don't do it...
You're also going to need new bushings, which means that they will need to be align honed to fit your new shaft.
My dist did not originally have a nylon button, or any button. There was some scoring on the dist, however not a lot of wear.
I used the brass button from the kit. I drilled a hole in the dist. housing for the brass button. (Not all the way through - shortened the stud on the button)
The button was too thick (thrust surface on the dist not machined), however I surfaced the brass button to the correct thickness to achieve the proper end play of the cross shaft.
I had read that the brass button was not ideal, so after about 10K miles I removed the dist and checked the brass button for wear. There was virtually none, just shiny where the gear was rubbing.
I think you and I discussed the brass button wear issue in some previous posts. You've had good luck with them, but I have had nothing but reliability issues with the brass. Here is what the brass buttons look like after just a few thousand miles of use in the distributors that I've seen:
For this reason, I now replace the worn surface with a mild steel insert that has slightly better durability than the cast iron stock surface. This also eliminates any hole drilling in the distributor. If the distributor is one of the units that has a factory hole for the nylon thrust button, I use a different design custom made mild steel thrust button that uses the locating hole.
I think you and I discussed the brass button wear issue in some previous posts. You've had good luck with them, but I have had nothing but reliability issues with the brass. Here is what the brass buttons look like after just a few thousand miles of use in the distributors that I've seen:
For this reason, I now replace the worn surface with a mild steel insert that has slightly better durability than the cast iron stock surface. This also eliminates any hole drilling in the distributor. If the distributor is one of the units that has a factory hole for the nylon thrust button, I use a different design custom made mild steel thrust button that uses the locating hole.
Lars
Any chance the end play was too tight in the ones you've seen ? Not sure if the wear you've seen are from your work or ones sent to you for repair. If your work, I'm sure the end play was correct.
If I had put the brass button in mine without checking the end play, mine would have looked like the one in your picture.
Likely time to have another look at mine, it's been in there since 2011.
03-10-2018, 06:14 PM
