Thanks for the responses and interest and advice folks! The a front gear was in so im not sure how I managed to put the shaft in backwards either. Guess I’m just that skilled! lol! I used a quite the liberal amount of Vaseline during assembly and you were on point with how much it smoked on start up! Straight up fog machine! Now for the news.

Got her started up bbuuuuut couldn’t get here in time to save my life. Stabbed and re stabbed the cas over and over. Even found tdc to make sure the pulley marks were correct and they were. I had to fully retard the timing to get it even close to lining up on the pulley and it popped and carried on and idled at 1500 or so. Did all kinds of stuff including taking offf the front pulley to make sure I hadn’t installed the cas gear backwards. And then tonight, eureka, I noticed an intermittent spark from the trailing side so I swapped another coil set in and it ran ****! Not perfect but timing was good. So I shut it down after it warmed up to check and adjust the tps. Furies her back up and she ran like **** again. Felt electric related and wouldnt ya know, i checked the ecu and it wasn’t even bolted down. It was mounted to a mount that came out of the car that donated the eco and the ground wires was finger lose. So I cleaned everything up and mounted the ecu properly and she fired up and ran like a champ! I ran her for a bit and shut her off and proceeded to install the rest of the belts and fan and shroud and I’ll fire her up tomorrow evening and she should be good. Ill update after!

 

She fires up and does the 3000 rpm for a couple seconds then hits 1500 or so til
the thermowax does its thing but then sometimes it drops to eight and sometimes it does not. At first I would try shutting her down and firing her back up and she would hit the perfect idle until I gave her some gas pedal action or at the intake manually. She revs good but then it hangs at 1500 until I manually move the throttle the tiniest of bits and then She will drop to 800 and sometimes a bit further and I have to nudge it back up before she stalls. Same thing can be done with the gas pedal, nudging it gently one way or the other. Made a minor adjustment on the dash pot throttle stop and that did nothing. I thought I had cleaned the throttle body awhile back but maybe the flaps are sticking inside? I ordered a brand new throttle cable tho i dont really think mine is stuck. I can hold the throttle in the back or by the tps and wiggle it slightly to get her idling perfect but it all goes back to 1500 once i rev her up. Thoughts?

 

Almost there, now I think what she needs is ran instead of idled. Had a bad ground that was causing various issues w the tack and the fluctuating idle and intermittent spark but she runs good w some new plugs. Still hangs around a 1000 after a quick gentle rev but like I said I think she needs run to break her in.

 

I would like to give a shout out to Bob Rhinehart from Rhinehart rotary. His shop is near me and over the years we have become good friends and he has gone way out of his way above and beyond to help me with this old girl. Every year for past 4 years or so he has wanted my car at his car show and last year we towed it there for posterity but this year June 7th, i may be driving it there. Even tho she doesn’t look the prettiest she will sound good.

 

I bought a bunch of parts from Bob a couple years ago. He was good to deal with and more than fair. Wouldn't hesitate do business again. I'd be glad to bring one of my cars to his annual meets if I was closer.