84 Caprice wagon

Hey everyone. Im new here and I have a couple of questions.

1. I have a 305 with a quadrajet carb. engine is still completely stock.
Im looking for some cheap and easy upgrades to raise hp. I know alot of you are going to say get a 350 but I want to keep the 305 in there. Im going to put a 350 in the 78 Caprice coupe I have.
Im only looking to raise the horsepower on the 305 from 150 to something like 235 or 250.

2. I want to buy exhaust headers but Im not sure if they will fit, I dont have much experience with engines but it seems to me that most of the ones I see that just go straight down will run into the frame of the car. Could be wrong but I just want to make sure before I spend the money.

got the car about a year ago, only had 2 ownders and is in excelent condition. Only a couple of veary tiny rust spots on the body.
Theres also what looks like some one took a pice of sandpaper and rubed it all over the hood and top but didint take of any paint.
And some rust around the license plate mounts on the bumbers.
its a brown woody, looks blue at night for some reason.

has 160k miles on it. Has had pretty regular maintnence, for some reason I have like every reciept from anything done to that car.

Well any ways im mike, im 20 years old, same age as my car :) and as i said havent had much experience with cars and engines, So any help you can provide would be greatly apriciated.

Thanks

unfortunately the 84 is the last year of the scut 700R4 tranny and the last year of no knock sensor (hence 1 point lower compression and 15-20 less hp)

no one wants a 305 so go look for a 85-86 H code 305 and ECM....it will do you right

Hey. I've got an '84 caprice sedan. I'm in the same boat. I'm lookin for cheap power upgrades and headers that will fit. let me know if ya find anything.

Ok i have a problem now.
A few weeks ago my car started to missfire at low rpm, and only when worm.
Replaced plugs and wires and still there.
Timed it 5 times, problem still there.
untill my 6th time when i forgot to plug the wire that you remove to time it back in.. The car runs great with it out. pulled off to the side of the road. turned it off, pluged that wire back in, problem comes back as soon as i put in in gear. unplug it. runs great.

What does that wire do, should i have it in. and what else can i do to fix this problem.
Its like the timing retards when it worms up.

When i unplug and plug the wire in while the engine is runing. the idle drops as soon as i unplug it. and rises back up when i plug it back in.

Thanks
Mike.

I'm not sure what ur talkin about. I can check on my car if I knew what color and where the wire is at? Does it start fine without the wire?

its a 3 prong cable that connects to the distributor. the connection is right overtop the pasanger side valve cover.
I have to keep my foot on the gas to get it to idle when its cold, but as soon as i put it in gear it stays runing fine.

and i use to have alot of pinging in the engine, its gone with it unpluged, I seem to get a little bit beter fuel millage, It used to diesel when i turn it off. dosnt do that any more. only bad side is my accelleration isnt quite as much as it used to be, never realy had much in the first place.

And all threw first gear i have this "turbo" type sound. like its forcing alot of air into the engine, I get power out the ass in first gear, once i goes into second the noise is gona and so is the power. but it runs ok, Im gona leave it off untill i can figure out whats wrong.

and about headers, Ive talked to a few people who say the A-body style headers should fit, but my require vearly little cuting into the body.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&category=33631&item=2476563530&rd=1&ssPageName=WDVW

my bad its a 4 prong cable. Runs from the bottom of the distributor up to the pasanger side valve covers, thats where the connection is. the other half of the wire runs into a wiring harness that im asuming runs to the computer.

I found it on mine. The only thing I noticed was a change in idle. Plugged it back in and everything was fine. I'm stumped.

As far as headers. What about the emissions air flow crap that goes to the manifolds now? I found headers that will fit it, but their cheap flowtech ones and there $175. The ones on ebay look nice, but I don't know about the emission bs.

Also, does yours have the metal cover over the manifold, on the passenger side, with the coil hose that goes up to the air cleaner? What is that for?

Only emisions that I have coming off of my exhaust system is what comes off the cat converter to the egr. the coil hose is for the thermastate in the air cleaner. if the engine is cold that thing is designed to close, but as with mine, and im sure yours is too. its ruster and dosnt work any more.

only thing that hose does is direct heat. nothing else goes threw it. i took mine off. and that cover of the intake is just part of that. as fare as i know it does nothing else.

Only thing i dont know about headers is if theres a place for the o2 sensor. witch we have to have untill our cars are classics becoues of the echeck bull shit.

thanks. Thats comin off next weekend. As far as the o2 sensor I don't know. We don't have echeck's in Michigan.

lucky you.. i just need to move out of ohio

hey call auto zone, they carry all kinds of header for our cars, i just bought and installed a set today, i live in ohio so i didnt need to have all the smog bs, but ehy do have them also.......i paid a wopping 80 bucks for my headers( flow tec is the brand) very easy to install, just remove manifolds,exhaust, and spark plugs and install, i bought a set of glass pack the bolt right to the headers.......good luck with what every you do..

I checked out the flo tec headers too. I didn't hear too many good things about them so I didn't buy them. Do they appear to be good?

that 4 wire connection is the EST connection to the HEI dist. if you are running without it, jumper the middle 2 wires (black and green) and it will run within the mechanical limits of the dist, but no knock control and if the dist has no vacuum advance - not real good advance.

i put them on the other day, i didnt havent to dimple them or anything....went right on, no problems at all....