The old rubber umbrella seals harden, crack and fall apart. It's pretty quick and easy to change them out. If you are going to keep the car, throw a fresh set of gaskets on the intake, put in a fresh double roller timing set, a windage tray and clean the oil pan while you're at it. You may need a fresh accelerator pump plunger if it sat for a long time. Add a phenolic spacer under the carb and insulate the fuel lines near the motor.

Then recurve the distributor so you can run a bit more initial with out going over 34 -36 total. Make sure you hook the vacuum up to manifold vacuum, so it retards when the throttle is opened..