Nope engine won't run with distributor in half a turn off.
When I was in high school, I pulled the 265 in my '55 hardtop and had it rebuilt. When I went to install it in the car, I didn't put my finger in the spark plug hole and got the distributor in 180 deg off.
I was working on a dairy farm after school and I was doing the work in the machine shed. When I got ready to start it, it kinda popped but not much else. Well with pickup handy, we decided to give it a push down the road since the battery was pretty close to dead. For some reason, I left the air cleaner off during this little exercise, probable because it was getting dark and I
wanted it to run.
We'll we got it out on the road and up to about 20 mph and I pulled the powerglide into drive. It promptly belched a pillar of flame about 6 feet high out of the 4-bbl. In the near darkness, it
DID get my attention. Put a new wrinkle in the seat cover..
I had it towed to a shop the next day and got to pay real money for that lesson in how to install your distributor.
