I’ve had an issue with my stroker since it’s been running.
It’s run hot, running down the hiway, and in traffic. 220 or better sometimes.
I’ve done something’s, and it’s gotten better, but it still boils the fuel in the carb bowls, and the car shuts off until cool down.
It’s brutally hot under the hood. Trying to open the hood after a drive, I’d almost leave skin on the hood latch, it’s so hot.
I’ve been reading about vacuum advance vs no advance.
I have an msd pro billet, which has no advance.
Would switching to an msd with advance, be benificial here?
I have a blaster coil, and digital 6 box, already.
I drive this thing 3 hours to Carlilse, and am always worried about traffic, or the fuel the bowls boiling and leaving me on the side of the road.
What say you? Ditch the non advance, and go with advance?
Car has a 180 stat, Afco radiator, flex fan, and a pusher spal fan.

I've run my challenger street/strip car with and without it. The only change I noticed with running it is that the plugs stay a whole lot cleaner driving around town. It did not make a difference on engine temp. If it runs hot going down the highway and the tuneup isn't way off, it probably has something to do with water flow or radiator sizing. You should have plenty of airflow at highway speeds to eliminate that as a cause. I run the Meziere WP114UHD pump with no thermostat and a 26" four row radiator.

I tried a pusher fan once years ago and I think it made the car hotter. The plan was to turn it on in traffic as needed. I would hit the switch and could sit there and watch the temp climb till I needed to eventually pull over. I ditched the whole setup and got a better radiator and fan w a good shroud, and never had trouble after that. Vacuum advance might help, but sounds to me like a cooling prob. Look at the drag week guys. Doubtful many are running vacuum advance distributors, but they can cruise down the freeway and in traffic all day.

Retarded timing can contribute to running hot.
So can a lot of other things.
I do not belive running vacuum advance will help your concern.
Knowing what you have done to the motor may help (cam,timing,exhaust set up ,etc,etc).

As mentioned,I agree a good fan and matching shroud really helps keep things cool.

What water pump? Had a issue and turned out it was water pump (was a cheap high volume one). Changed to a milodon high volume and problem went away.

Do you have a fan shroud, if not you need one, I have a 512 in my Charger has A/C & am in Southeast Tx, it gets plenty hot here, my car will run 180 ish all day long, I do run a vac advance & yes it helps with under hood temps.

Personally, I have never been able to get a flex fan cool anything bigger than a 318. But unless the fan is restricting air flow somehow, it is not likely to be the problem when running down the road.

I agree with those that feel that the vacuum advance is not the problem, either. I will bet that the root problem is with either the tune or the cooling system.

I run a flex fan on my Dart with a well built homemade shroud. Keeps the 517" 700+ hp engine at 180 with no problems. Before the good shroud it was a problem in town but not on the highway.

My 72 Satellite had the water pump issue that is similar to his problem. Guessing its around 650+ hp runs 10.0. Car had a heat problem even on the highway After changing the water pump no issues at all.

Neither car has vacuum advance.

What kind of shroud do you have?

Check the water pump.

Install an aluminum down core radiator.

Yeah you're cooking the engine compartment by running retarded timing down the freeway. Add 10 degrees of advance and it will cool down a whole bunch. We just ran some dyno tests the other day where an extra 10 degrees of timing cooled the headers down from 1700 degrees to 1200 degrees. This was at 2000 rpm with a small load. Exactly what your engine is seeing going down the freeway.

What is the timing set @ on the car now?

Do you know what your AFRs are through the RPM range? Being lean in the cruise mode will raise the temp.
I also have a 6al-2 that lets me create my own timing curve being adjustable every 100 rpm.
You should be able to run under 190* no matter what the ocean temp is in your BOAT!,,,,,,LMOL

No shroud at the moment.
This isn’t like a muscle era car. Core support and front area not friendly to larger radiator without modifications.
Car is away for the winter.. when it comes back out, I’ll see where my timing is at.

Andy,
Are you saying add 10 degrees now, or go to a vacuum advance, and do it that way?
Because it also heats up in traffic.

Forgot to mention, it’s got an m1 intake and a “ 1000 cfm” quick fuel carb.

This is with the old intake/carb setup, but same issue.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=VtWKWolqtCE

I've seen it make a big difference in coolant temp, i've seen it make not much. Depends on how much advance you are starting with and how much vacuum adds. Stock slow curve 5 initial 30 total type setups it can be a huge improvement.

As Andy noted it WILL make a big difference in exhaust temp, which will reduce your under hood temps. That sounds like the real issue as far as your fuel boiling.

Are those headers ceramic coated, or just silver painted? Header wrap near the fuel line could help, if they are just painted you might want to consider wrapping the whole headers.

Are you still running a drop base? A flat base will also make a bigger difference than one might think keeping the carb cool as well.

No vacuum advance on anything with a decent overstock cam, because, well, the vacuum signal is completely different from a stock configuration and they don't work. Mechanical advance set up to get some timing in it early.

Could it stand to be fattened up some? My temp gauge would show it if mine got lean.

160 stat or none at all. Good fan/shroud assembly on the back of the radiator. Pushers are in the way of the air getting into the radiator.

I'm a big proponent of vac advance for street cars & hot rods - basically anything that isn't a race motor - for all the advantages known for some time: cleaner plugs (better firing, basically), MPG, less fuel wash, etc.
Makes sense also that it could bring temps down, reference the recent thread on setting timing on a fresh engine for break-in and how much cooler the exhaust manifolds/headers were.

But you likely have another issue as well. Not sure if you have enough radiator capacity though it looks pretty big in the photo.

I had a 512" Duster, 26" alum rad, that would run 195-210 even in coolish weather. Alum (Indy) heads, MSD6, TTI headers, pretty cammed up.
I added a fan shroud, swapped a smaller water pump pulley on, temps came down to 170-ish. Swapped the fixed-blade for a flex fan to reduce the windmill, never saw 175 again.
After that I swapped out the mech-only distributor for a vac unit and that cleaned up the plugs. Seemed to help underhood temps a bit but it wasn't a controlled experiment.

The car really looks and sounds fantastic. Love it.

Do you have wideband?
If not, a gauge to eliminate the possibility of a lean condition could probably help figure it out.

I'm a far cry from professional tuner status however when I started working with the wideband I was suprised how
good the car ran, and how well it would go down the road with as lean as 17:1 a/f . But the temp gauge would always climb quick.

That's just one possible piece of the puzzle, though. Sorry for not answering the actual question, just wanted to mention there could be
alot of factors contributing to the problem. I haven't used vacuum advance in anything for some time now but I do
like to have it on daily driver type builds.

I am an old school analog guy but this little knob works wonders!

I put it it the middle of the settings for 38°. Then I can add a little going down the highway or pull out some for the current 150 hp nitrous shot.