Carbureted Ford 460

"Does any one know if the 1973

"Does any one know if the 1973-1988 Ford 7.5L(460) as used in the marine application, OMC King Cobra, has the cam timing retarded 8.5 degrees ??? According to John Geraghty's publication they could be greatly improved in performance by replacing the plastic cam sprocket with a two row steel timing chain assembly and correcting the retarded cam position at the same time.

I had him do my 1983 motorhome when he was still in business and it was a significant improvement.

My son's 1987 Bayliner, Ciera, Sunbridge with the King Cobra set up could use a little more ooomph, and it seems this would be an easy way to get it.

Thanx, Dave"

"This brings back memories for

"This brings back memories for me from 30 years ago. The 351 and 400 modified series of big blocks that ford used in the late 70`s had their camshaft timing retarded to meet emission standards.The camshaft gears from those motors are interchangeable with the 460 ones. All the gears have a mark for lining them up to the gears on the crankshaft . When you compared them to the 460 you could see the mark was in a different place and we used to use 460 gears to greatly improve the performance of the modified engines.
Now it`s conceivable that you could retard a 460 using the modified gear and this might be how they did it to your marine application. If this is the case then a stock 460 gear should solve your problem. Just remember that if you decide on changing the gear , you will have to move your distributor 1 tooth to compensate.I`m not saying that this is definitely a cure for you, only trying to add to your information. I do know that most of the ford pickups with modified engines that were sold at the dealership I worked at had the camshaft timing gear changed and the distributor moved and they all showed noticeable performance gains along with better fuel economy."

Retarding cam timing improves

Retarding cam timing improves top end; advancing it improves mid-range. It definitely needs to be advanced IF it's retarded.

Jeff