235 tune up

I have a 59 suburban with a stock 235. It's running pretty rough at the moment. I have been spending all my time working on the body. Now it's time to get the engine running smoothly.
I'm pretty sure the crankcase vent is stopped up, the one that points down to the road. I need to fix this, replace the plugs, points and maybe wires. What else should I look at? I rebuilt the carb a few months ago. I need to drive this hulk around 150 miles a week so it needs to run good. Plus, my wife needs to drive it as well.


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do yourself a favor and throw the points distributor in the trash.
You should be able to find a 6 cylinder HEI in the junk yard in a late 70`s early 80`s straight 6, if you decide to go this route, make sure you run a new wire to the HEI that supplies a solid 12 volts, points ran off 6 volts, while HEI`s will run on that also, it`ll run bad off idle. I would also invest in some spiral core spark plug wires and not bother with the cheap solid core parts store wires.
If you add a HEI you`ll notice quicker starts and likely better throttle response, also less time between tune ups.

Will the entire distributer just swap out? I did this on my moms 64 impala a few years ago.

it should be a direct swap.

Thanks. Any more ideas? I intend to replace this 130 horse wonder with a small block within a year or so. Until then it needs to run great.

[color=yellow][size=2]Doc Here

If it's a high mileage older engine, start your tune up with a compression test and vacuum check, should be around 125 to 150 a hole, and the vacuum gauge should pull a steady 17 to 20 In.Hg at idle. This will eliminate Valves and rings right off.

The HEI as DV said is a must for reliability and performance. And as said before it needs 12 Volts (no resistor) to work, so you can use the wire going to the resistor, but not the resistor.

Replace the fuel and Air filters.

You may even consider rebuilding the carb if it's really dirty.

Adjust the carb, Set your idle jets for highest idle with no stumble or miss and check your choke. Curb idle should be around 950.(if automatic)

That should get you off to a good start.

Hope it helps.

Doc [/color][/size]

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The tube pointing to the ground is a road draft tube used for pulling oil vapor out of the crankcase.

I've heard over on ChevyTalk that California passed laws against them sometime close to 1958. So vehicles from there may not have one but a PCV instead.

I still run the points distributor on my 1960 235 and the engine runs quite well.

It's in a 1957 Chevrolet (windowed) Sedan Delivery I've owned now 23 years. Plans are to replace this 235 with a 1957 235 I own.

What could be causing your engine problem could be something like a stuck needle in the carburator?

Will a 230 distributor fit in a 235?