Before removing the stock set, I degreed the cam. The 244/244 cam was there, but it had a lobe seperation angle 113. This is a 1980 Aspen. I have a 1979 Shop manual. The specs listed for 79 give a 109 LSA. So Chrysler evidently widened the LSA. I installed the crank gear with +4 degrees advance. This moved the I/E lobe centers from 116/110 to 110/116 for a change of +6 degrees. So the stock cam, as I found it, had -3 degrees retard. The chain and gears I removed were in suprisingly good shape for 110K miles and fell just outside Chrysler's criteria for replacement (1/8 inch movement on cam gear with crank gear stationary). Attributing 2 degrees to wear and stretch, I'd say the stock cam was ground with -1 degrees of retard with 0 degrees in the crank gear. The +6 degrees agrees with my finding the spark timing had moved from 14 to 20 BTDC. Oh, I degreed the balancer and found the timing mark to be dead on correct. The car does have a small, but definitely noticible improvement power. I'll see what my fuel mileage shows.

The JP set is well made and worth the cost. For those that do not know, the crank gear does not have a 'dot' to align with the cam gear and the crank gear has 25 teeth as opposed to 19 on the stocker So you could easily be off one tooth. I replaced the timing cover bolts with studs. This facilitated positioning the cover (and gasket) upon reinstallation and I did not have to loosen the oil pan bolts. The cover went over the dowel pins without a fight. Use sealer where the threads go into the water jacket.

I bought this set from Cox brothers Racing. Nice guys to do business with.

Cox Brothers Inc.
614-268-9930
614-268-9930 fax
<A HREF="mailto:CoxBros66@msn.com">CoxBros66@msn.com</A>

Regards

Mitch

m5black@aol.com

Great up-date Mitch, I agree that when you have used a JP set, there is no "going back" to the other double roller set-ups. I sleep well knowing that both gears are made of high quality steel. (Yes, I have seen broken cast iron top gears, it's a nasty failure)

As we keep saying, "degree-in your cam and set it where you *want* it." The JP set is harder to "figure-out" installation wise, there are a whole bunch of numbers on the parts so this tends to push you towards using the degree wheel.

Great to see that your old set-up was pretty close right from the factory, I've seen many that are not. Let us know how the MPG works out.
DD

how much is it?

scooterthedog@hotmail.com

90bux for the set if i remember right from the catalog.