340Help!!

Valves not moving is a bad sign that the cam has gone south. One reason it never ran good was probably the timing. With a performance cam you need to give it more initial timing and you did the opposite. If the dist. had been set up properly I bet it would have ran pretty good. As for losing power when you accelerated quickly, that could have been a lack of fuel. Maybe a bad fuel pump, clogged filter, or possibly dirt in the carbs main jets. Sorry to say but it sounds like it's time to yank it back out and completely go through it again because as mentioned earlier when a cam goes bad it fills the engine full of trash and needs cleaned out. And don't be too hard on yourself about not getting the timing right and a carb that was too big. We all had to learn. I give you credit for doing it yourself.