[Will]

I've seen an engine start and barely run with the distributor 180 out. There is no way you could have put it under any load. It was popping through the carb and the exhaust and bucking like crazy. I've installed enough distributors, both correctly and incorrectly to state categorically that if you had installed the distributor 180 degrees out of phase you would not now be driving the car.

Also, there is absolutely no point in changing the distributor/cam gear relationship by one tooth as long as you have room to rotate the distributor housing. The only reason to do that would be in the case where you've got the distributor rotated so far in one direction that the vac. can is hitting the manifold or firewall and you still haven't achieved the correct timing setting.

From reading this thread, I'm with Tom V and the others who say the cam is not degreed correctly. 130-140 psi seems awfully low. I was getting 170 psi with a cam with 20 degrees more duration than that one and only about one point more mechanical compression ratio. The low cranking compression (coupled with the overall lack of power) is the biggest red flag I'm seeing indicating improper cam timing.