Yeah the cam on the choke system increases the idle when the choke is on, to keep the engine from choking. I've never put points in. They may have been replaced in the past, but not by me. There is spark at the points, and orange spark from the coil. I pulled the valve cover and the valves are all moving. Never went through and checked lash, as i'm not sure what kind of lifters are in the engine. It is a truck engine, and there was lash in the rockers (not preload), so i'm assuming they're solid. Yeah, like I said, the engine ran before without any of the check balls in so..... ???
The whole having the choke on deal is hard for me to understand as well. For one thing, it gets rid of the hesitation that there is when stepping on the pedal. I don't know if that is because it is running at a higher rpm, or if its because the carb is now off the idle circuit and on the main circuit. As far as I can tell, it doesn't help the missing at all. The missing isn't something that is always there. Somedays it will run fine and not miss, somedays it will start to miss after it is ran for awhile, somedays it will miss right away after startup. Seems to miss more often than not lately. Plugs seemed to fix the missing, but only temporarily, then the plugs get dark again. 4 of the 6 were dark today.
And the popping at idle is just something that it randomly does. When running it idles as smooth as can be, but still will softly pop out the exhaust randomly.
Plug wires are new and in correct order. Plugs are gapped at .035". Vacuum advance is working. Carb is getting plenty of fuel. Floats are set to spec. Carb has good pump shot. Idle is good. Sprayed carb cleaner around intake air sealing areas and couldn't detect any increase in rpms.
