LUVTruck.com

I was driving to work a few weeks ago and noticed my truck was sluggish almost like I was towing something. At the end of the day on the way home the truck was bogging down and would not go over 30.

Ive owned the truck for a month prior to that day it ran great! The previous owner replaced the cap and rotor. I did the wires and plugs, had the oil changed and other basic stuff before this happened.

This weekend ctmandu came over to diagnose it for me because I'm clueless. We discovered that one side of the (month old) distributor cap was worn from the rotor and on the other side was not close to metal post inside. So obviously one cylinder was not firing (I think #4 and #1 was the one rubbing). After replacing the distributor and cap there was an improvement, but it seems like it is missing and still bogs down when driving. I also noticed when I was pulling off the air cleaner the center of the carburetor was loose, I tightened that down.

We checked
Timing
Points
Vacuum leaks
Compression (was good)
Gap on spark plugs (they where off)
It has new wires
Replaced distributor with a used one (I have another one I'm going to try)

I'm going to swap out the carburetor with the one ctmandu had in his warehouse of luv parts.

If you guys have any feed back it would be much appreciated. My biggest question is if there anything that would cause the distributor cap to wear like that other than being on cockeyed.

Do you know how hot it is running when this problem occurs,or is it constant?

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"You can't please everyone,so you've got to please yourself"

The dist. shaft could be bent. Might try swapping the dist. and see if that helps.

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OK, I'm over it. Where's the beer?

It's constant, we stuck a different distributor on it and it improved the idle ext.... but its still running rough and bogging out. I need to start hunting for a carb gasket tomorrow and I will try ctmandu's carb.

How about adjusting the valves while you are at it.

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1978 pro street step/side 455Buick, 4sp,4.11s, 31/18.5s

Does it idle fine but not go fast? Have you noticed if your idle RPMs are dropping at all? I'll look stupid asking but have you changed your fuel filters lately? My truck is finicky and if the filter gets the least big clogged it runs like crap. A definite sign for me is when my idle goes bad, it's time to change the fuel filter.

I have no clue on the distributor cap wear.

Also if it idles fine but doesn't run past a certain speed it could also be your fuel pump. I had a problem like that on a previous vehicle.

It was a combo of bad carb and distributor. Thanks for all your help!