One of my students is working on his 292 and we cannot get the thing to idle?? I will run as long as we are giving it gas and keeping the rpm's up but it will not idle?? We had one carb on it that had a very loose throttle shaft (big vacuum leak) so we changed it to another. It ran better but still no idle? Found a vacuum leak on the carb spacer, fixed it and again ran some better but still wont idle. It seems to me like we still have a massive vacuum leak somewhere but am having a heck of a time finding it. Could it maybe be the carb is that far out of whack? Adjusted the air fuel and idle screws to no avail. In addition, this thing is making real low vacuum, if I remember like between 10 and 15. What are your ideas? thanks-

Dan, this could have a variety of situations causing the poor idling sympton and i guess i,ll start it and see who joins in, i,m sure we will get there. I would think it may be running without enough timing, try advancing it up then reset carb, get it started then just rotate distributer to increase idle slightly and see if it will continue to run ok. Low enginge vacuum 10-15 could be late timing, assuming that there is no vacuum leak at intake to cyl head area, It will take step by step eliminating  major parameters so we are not overlooking anything before moving to another situation. regards aussie bill.

  AussieBill            YYYY    Forever Y Block     YYYY

 Down Under, Australia

Dan:

Does the engine have a PCV valve?  If so, try plugging the hose and see if it will idle.  Maybe too big a PCV, or installed backwards??

John - "The Hoosier Hurricane"

Don`t guess. Put a vacuum gage on the intake and measure the vacuum. If the engine runs it will have some reading. If you do have a large leak it might be mismatch from the intake to the intake ports of the heads. Pete

Pete, has anyone heard back from Don re the idle problem or fix, thanks. aussie bill.

  AussieBill            YYYY    Forever Y Block     YYYY

 Down Under, Australia

Student bought a new pcv and it looks to plumbed correctly, the idle is better but its not quite there yet, I think some tuning might help some, he is currently chasing around a few water leaks, its getting there though! Thanks for the help!