So , upon actually measuring the gap and resulting play, it is more like 0.060". The rounded, tapered edge of the shaft gave the wrong illusion of something bigger.
If it was moving up and down that much, would it really make a difference? that amount of up/down movement seems to be small compared to the height of the cam and the cam-follower.

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Took the distributor apart tonight. All looks in decent shape. This time I went down to the counterweights. I little old oil buildup, but the weights were still freely moving. Cleaned it all up and reassembled. There was no side to side play at all; nary a wobble. There is about 1/8" up and down play but I believe that to be normal.

So distributor seems to be good. If I knew of a place near Houston that had one of those Sun distributor testing places (or equiv) I would take it there to see if it is operating perfectly. Maybe I will call around, in a city this big there has to be someone reputable. I'll also do the dist tests in the service manual to adjust spring tensions etc.

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I do have the original plug wire supports. Been looking for the wider '56 ones but haven't seen them available at Borth (haven't called Dulinksy yet). I will look and pay special attention to closely paralleled wire, esp 5 & 7.

thanks for the advice.

Howard,
yes, the way I have it connected is electrically the same as in the manual; both lugs are connected to the same fixed stud. Wasnt thinking when i posted....

I don't feel any significant wobble in the shaft, but I would guess I would need to take the top end apart to know for sure. There is no indication in the cap of any irregularity, or offset wear.

Jselph- I just measured across the terminals with it installed, wired, and cold. I would think that a resistor changing its value with temperature to be normal. But is there a better way to test this one to be sure?

thanks for the comments.

thanks. Decided to go with Daytona Parts after calling them and O.D. and other's strong recommendations. They quoted $325 + return shipping. Going to drop it by UPS tomorrow and Tim at Daytona said it should be about 2 weeks. I didn't get that secondary shaft to move freely yet and it seems like it might take some extra care so I opted for the professionals. I will post pics when it comes back.

Now on to the ignition system. Ever since I got it in 2016 it would idle somewhat smoothly yet have an irregular miss. Thought maybe it was the carb, so I rebuilt with no change. I put a timing light on and it seems like it was randomly not firing, did the same with a spark tester.
Since 2016 (and almost no miles) I have replaced:
-Spark Plug wires
-Spark Plugs (Champion H10s, then AL 437)
-Coil (twice as post on 1st NAPA one stripped)
-Dist cap
-Dist rotor
-Wires to dist from coil
-Wires inside dist
-Points and condenser (tried a couple), have NOS ones now.
-Cleaned Dist but did not completely take it apart
-New battery
-Dist vacuum advance rebuilt by Terrill

External resistor on firewall measures 1.7 ohm, which seems about right.

Just pulled it out again and looked at the unit. I put it back together just like I got it, but it is different than the service manual. In the manual, the condenser lead is separated from the points breaker lever spring and the lead from the primary terminal by an insulator. But in mine, they are all in contact with each other. Wondering if that is causing my intermittent spark problem? Thinking I will see if I can change it to match the manual to see what happens (once I have a working carb so I can run the engine).

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A few posts I mentioned that I bought a new primary shaft off of ebay for my WCFB carb. It is a little longer so sent it to my nephew in Colorado to try to transform it into the original dimensions. That is in work, so we will see how that works.

In the meantime, I saw a 4GC for sale on ebay for $69 so I bought it. Received it last week and it needs some work, as expected. Both the primary and secondary throttle shafts were seized (as disclosed inthe ebay auction).

Soaked the bottom in Evaporust and used a lot of PB Blaster and was able to free the primary shaft. It turns very easily now. Still working on the secondary, but slowly getting there.

Has anyone used and have any recommendations for carb rebuilders? It is hard to find a company online that doesnt have a mix of good/bad reviews.

Carb-X will sell me a rebuilt one for $350 (plus core), but their Yelp reviews have a both great and bad reviews.

Sparky's starts at $325.

Quadrajetpower.com, they do 4GCs too, $300

Carburetor USA is $239 for 6 mo warranty, $330 for 1-year & shipping

An Ebay 'auction' for rebuilding services offers $250.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/ROCHESTER-4GC-CARBURETOR-REBUILD-SERVICE-REMANUFACTURE-TESTED-TUNED-WARRANTY-/323687698637?_trksid=p2385738.m4383.l4275.c10

and there is The Carburetor Shop (mikescarbshop.com) but I haven't called yet to get a price.

Anybody have any experience with any of the above companies???

I know I can freshen it up with a great home cleaning and a carb kit (not sure which one, there are no numbers on it). But was thinking a professional shop would be able to make it look a little better, plus test and adjust it on a real engine. Trying to eliminate problems to get this thing running smoothly

Who do you use????

(I am in Houston)

thx
Bob

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Made a lot of progress over the last couple of weeks. I was able to re-seat the load arm into the support arm 'stirrup'. Ended up putting a floor jack under the frame near the rear wheel, and another floor jack under the center of the rear axle. By moving the axles and pushing the car, the two lined up.

Once the wheels were back on the ground, I was then able to get the Watts linkages re-attached to the studs. Wasnt too hard, but took pushing the back end of the car down (via water jugs in the trunk) until it all lined up. Then I was able to install the new shocks (KYB 343149 as per Dwight's Cormorant article).

So rear end is ready to go. Now back to the carb saga.....

Took the Watts linkage apart. Used Howard's advice to cut off the rivets and tap the studs to ease reassembly. Put in 4 new bushings to replace the inners and had to grind the heads of the new bolts to give clearance.
The bigger two bushings that allow the inner assembly to rotate seemed to be in good shape. They are $12.50 each at Max, and Dwights didnt provide new ones on this kit, I lubed them with some silicone grease and reinstalled.

Watts linkage is ready to go once I get that damn load arm to reseat.!!!

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Relative to the WCFB throttle shafts, I sent the new, longer, one to my nephew that has a machine shop to see if he could shorten it to match the old one. We will see.

Made progress on the rear bushings. I removed the driver rear support arm completely so I could cut out the broken Watts linkage attachment stud. A little bit of effort with my Dremel and many cutting wheels did the trick. The new ones bolted on. Hoping the fact that the Watts linkage attach point will now be about 3/4" further aft than the welded stud won't be a problem.
Cleaned it all up, then reinstalled with the new poly bushings. Getting the front 3 bolts of the support arm in was a PITA since there are two plates where it attaches to the frame and it took a lot of effort to get them to stay aligned. Dwight suggests using a thin metal plate on top of the upper bushings to keep them from being distorted so I used a metal electrical box cover and cut it down. Had to fight with getting the load arm to reseat in the support arm saddle bracket, but enough ups and downs of the axle and frame seemed to get them to line up.
Repeated the process for the passenger side. Here are pics of the new stud (required a tad bit of grinding to get the shock absorber attach bracket to fit.

Load arm gap is there as it was when I used floor jack to raise the frame with the Watts linkages and shocks removed. But , damn, I can't get these two back together. The hanging bracket is much too inboard to mate with load arm. Tried raising frame, lowering axle, vice versa and all combinations. But can't seem to make it work.

I could use some advice. Tried looking at other posts in these forums, but nothing seemed to help out.

thanks for reading

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Have not been able to find the exact throttle shaft (3-961) anywhere or any old WCFBs that are known to have this shaft. I did buy this one on ebay, a 3-1111 as David Packards list shows it will fit the same throttle plates. It is really close but too long at the secondary throttle linkage end.. Thinking it wouldn't be too hard to get someone to cut it down to length, cut the flats, and tap a hole. Also need to swap linkages on the other end. Hoping there are carb shops out there that can do this easily. Might call Carb Junkies and a few more to see if they can do this kind of work with precision. Any suggestions as to who would be good at this?

Would also be good to have someone check and mill throttle body to ensure it is flat to manifold. I have a vacuum leak somewhere that is eluding me and this seems like a possibility.

Curious is this the right gasket for the throttle body to intake? Seems odd with the space under the gasket between banks and hard to get it to seal if both sides aren't perfectly flat.

Next up, some pics of the replacement of the rear support arm bushings..

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