It sounds like we gotta wait till you can put a cap with the drilled hole on a running eng & with the light on it see if it (the RP) changes. I've never used a dist machine but I'm sure it would show the same thing. Maybe this will help: say the rotor is dead centered on the cap terminal at rest (no mech adv). the other cap terminal is 45 deg away, now if a can with 11 stamped on it swung the rotor around the arc 11 deg (& it will) and say the mech adv added 24 at the crank (which is reasonable/feasible) with reasonable slot lengths which'd be 12 at the rotor, if the mech adv did alter RP (it wont but lets say it will) the rotor will have moved a total of 23 deg (11+12) & there'd be no way it could fire with that great of a distance between rotor tip and cap terminal as that is half the circumferential distance between the cap terminals. Humor me if you will! try the test in the vise. I agree it makes NO sense that since the reluctor moves with adv (& it does) then how could the rotor which is locked to it set in stone NOT move also. it is hard to visually grasp & I could not mentally grab the how it did what it does till this issue came & I went out into the kitchen & grabbed a dist to try to prove my case even tho I've seen it multiple times when doing dist work on vehicles so I know it to be true but unlike Trendz I could not mentally grasp exactly HOW until this. Just Take 5 minutes with your vise or just held in your hands. Hurry, lunch is in an hour and a half & I wanna order a steak (your treat)!