sablesurfer; First off, I looked at your gallary article to determine that we're talking about a 292 - right? When you say "left of the center line" are you talking about as viewed from the front?
"advance" on the timing means the number of degrees before TDC that your ignition "fires". Look closely on that thingy with the teeth on it, one of them should be marked with a "0" - that is TDC. As atomarc says, the crank is rotating clockwise as viewed from the front. The ignition should fire a few degrees BTDC, i.e. "left of the mark" as viewed from the front. I'd start with about 6 degrees BTDC and go from there. I believe each "tooth" and each valley represents 2 degrees. BUT, before you put the light on it, check your point dwell, should be 31-34 degrees (if your don't have a dwell meter, check the gap - should be .019", THEN remove and plug the vacuum line going to the dizzy, now you're ready for the timing light. As has been stated before recently, you can experiment with the amount of advance you finally end up with by listening for a slight pinging under load, then back off the timing (retard it) until the pinging just goes away.
