Large RPM and Vacuum drop when shifting from park to gear

I don't want to hijack this post but all the info here has been great as I have wondered the same things on my car. My question is how to test if your vacuum advance is working. In theory when I am at idle and set my timing at a certain point with the vacuum advance disconnected at lets say 10* and pulling about 15-16 in of vacuum at idle, when I reconnect the advance to the spark port on the side of the carb then shouldn't it jump forward a few degrees? If it doesn't does that mean my vacuum advance canister is bad? Same as if I accelerate the engine with or without it connected it seems like the timing advances at the same exact rate in any part of the rpm range


No, ported vacuum will NOT move the timing at idle.