Hey guys I recently have found a guy willing to part with a 455 Buick that I want to swap into my Electra. He's been working on these engines all his life and seems very knowledgeable. He has a '73 455 and he said one of the best things to do is to get a new timing gear and advance the cam because the cams apparently were retarded 12 degrees from the factory. is there any truth to this?
No. Unless the cam was degreed, he likely has no idea where it's installed at. Timing chain stretch can retard a cam.
Chevy was known to grind some retard into the cam on select engines, although I can't say that I know Buick did that, and I don't remember how much retard Chevy used. Point is, it's not unheard-of. A degree wheel and dial indicator would tell that tale.
Buick factory gear set have 4 degrees advance built into them, if you go with the ta 9 keyway set that gets taken out. I have run into this with my current cam ta 308s. To get to the 108 took being on the plus 6. When I wanted to get to 104 thete was not enough adjustment, had to jump the cam forward a tooth then retard the crank to get back to 104. My call with make at TA is where I was informed about the factory sets have the advance built in
I'm having some trouble wrapping my head around this. Does the Buick TIMING SET have "4 degrees advance" built-in, or is the Buick CAMSHAFT ground with 4 degrees of advance? Are all the "Big Block Buick" OEM timing sets set-up for 4 degrees of advance? I would have expected the cam to have the advance built-in, rather than the timing set. Perhaps I'm wrong.
What I was told by mike wad the timing set had 4 degrees built in from the factory, some cams are ground with advance built in too. Bottom line doesn't really matter degree all cams in to know where you are. From what mike told me was if you had a stk timing set in dot to dot, degreen ot to see where you are, if I would pur the ta double roller 9 way set in dot to dot I would be 4 degrees retard from the factory set on the same cam.
