Bought a 69 442 that needs restore some years ago. Finally getting round to working on it.
I pulled the (fouled) plugs and put marvel mystery oil in the cylinders before I turned it by hand.
I just realized it is not the original engine (VIN). It is a 69 G block with C heads but I noticed it has the
tabs on the left rocker cover to run the battery cable and the car is an automatic. The carburetor
is numbered for a manual transmission but the distributor is numbered for automatic.
If it is the 350HP engine will the distributor work or will it cause problems? (note the fouled plugs above).
Thanks for any advice. Shawn

 

The distributor shouldn’t cause any issues. But I wonder how you concluded those parts were for MT / AT applications? Post the numbers and the experts here can say definitively what they are as so many online sources are woefully inaccurate.

 

I hope you aren't subscribing to the myth that Qjet carb numbers are odd for MT and even for AT. The original carb for an AT car was 7029251. For an MT car it was 7029253.

 

There's also a high likelihood that all of the things you described have been changed - many times - over the course of the car's life. It's a bit of a stretch to assume they're original to the engine in the car and the engine is a replacement. Have you checked the stamped numbers below the driver's side head? There are many references on the forum regarding where to find the pad and numbers.

 

Thanks for the replies. Engine block: 396026G
Quadrajet: 7029253
Distributor: 1111933
The engine VIN does not match the car VIN.
The engine is not original but period correct (which I just found out). What leads me to believe it is a manual trans engine
is the tabs mounted to the left valve cover. Battery positive cable on automatics ran over wheel well
back toward firewall, battery cable on manual trans jumped right across to engine and along the back
of the valve cover (held in place by tabs on valve cover) to firewall and down to starter.
The difference between 325hp automatic and 350hp manual from what I can find is cam, dist, and carb.
The timing is different between the two, 8deg vs 12deg.
Also, no tag on oil fill tube. Anything else I can check (without pulling cam) ? Thanks

 

Is the VIN derivative on the block a 1968 or 69 number (second character is the year)? Understand that the factory initial timing specs assume a totally stock engine running gasoline that was available when the car was new. Between today's crappy gas and carbon buildup in the combustion chambers and who knows what's going on in the distributor, it's likely that neither of those numbers is best.

 

Number 9, I am guessing someone picked up a junkyard engine for a replacement and they needed a distributor.

 

You can pull a valve cover and a set of rockers to measure the lobe lift off the cam going by the pushrod lift x 1.6

auto cams had .440” lift, manual cams were .472”

that’s assuming the cam is original to the engine

 

You could also check the back of the crankshaft to see if it has been machined for a pilot bearing.