I knew it was too good to be true

[Phantomht]

well. i got a drive shaft and had it shortened, cost about 75$ more than i was expecting but whatever.

had started the motor for about a minute, set the timing, sounded great. no alternator bracket so i have nothing to spin the water pump.

ordered alternator brackets and was waiting for them in the mail. was thinking, well, i can hook up the electric radiator fan and maybe clean up some wiring.
i hooked up a switch to the fan, hid all the wires, looked like a nice job, got rid of some other wiring that didnt look like it was hooked up to anything, etc...

tried starting the motor again and noticed straight away the idle was about 500 rpms lower than it should be. gave it a little gas and getting popping and backfire thru the carb. omfg.

went all back thru my wiring 2, 3, 4 times, cant find shit that doesnt look right. even reconnected things to better sources like the MSD HOT and ground. hooked up a ground strap from the head to the frame rail, eliminated the thru-the-firewall coil adapter and mounted the coil on the engine side of the firewall, no difference.

alternator bracket arrived today. if i hadnt touched the wiring a couple nights ago i could be running my car up and down the street terrorizing the neighbors right NOW. but no.

so. i dont know what to do now. thinkin bout going to the junkyard and picking up a HEI and pulling all my MSD stuff out and hooking up the HEI just to see if that will work or not. if it does, then something is screwy with one of my current components, which, were all submerged in the flood we had here in 2006. which sounds like a leading cause for failure on some level, but like i said, everything sounded great and was working fine 2 days ago, then i hook up a fan switch and clean up some wiring and now i got this.

if the HEI works, then i think im just gonna have a better HEI built for me rather than putting the setup i got now back in. MSD Billet distrib, MSD Digital 6+ and MSD coil.