Not an expert, but, since noone I know has ever attempted to bolt a 196 to a dyno. I would suggest a chassis dyno? Should work pretty well with your stick shift car to see where the power actually drops off at. Surely, even if not audible through that massive old casting, there is a point where to much, is to much! Take it to the drag strip. Add timing till is slows down. I'll go away now as I don't really know much about it. I do know that year-old gas with stabil in it makes the American ping. :( add mid grade and noise is gone :) ------Original Message------ From: Tom Jennings Sender: amc-list-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxx To: AMC, Rambler, Nash, Jeep and family ReplyTo: AMC, Rambler, Nash, Jeep and family Subject: [AMC-list] spark lead question for tuning experts like NickAlfano... Sent: Oct 20, 2009 12:30 AM Someone with dyno experience ought to know this stuff by the seat of their pants, me I'm stabbing in the dark... When you have a motor dialed in, just how sensitive is it to ignition lead timing when it's under heavy load? In other words, if you have the timing dialed in reasonably close, how many degrees away is detonation? How much power is lost is it's retarded another degree or two or three? I know it will vary with combustion chamber and compression and a whole slew of factors. But for "sort of stock" or stock motors, how touchy is maximum ignition timing, power-wise? Bottom line is, how close to detonation should one push timing before it's a waste of time? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: <http://list.amc-list.com/pipermail/amc-list-amc-list.com/attachments/20091019/72178379/attachment.htm> _______________________________________________ AMC-list mailing list AMC-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://list.amc-list.com/listinfo.cgi/amc-list-amc-list.com Sent from my BlackBerry® wireless device from U.S. Cellular _______________________________________________ AMC-list mailing list AMC-list@xxxxxxxxxxxx http://list.amc-list.com/listinfo.cgi/amc-list-amc-list.com