For my carb intakes, I set it as high as possible to the point where it pings under load, then back off 1 or 2 degrees. 

1965CS wrote:

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"...I set it as high as possible to the point where it pings under load, then back off 1 or 2 degrees..." 

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I was going to suggest the exact same thing!.
My Dad turned me onto this years ago and I've always found it better than using a timing light and factory specs being it takes into consideration the actual engine and it's used and/or modified components..
Plus a road test is necessary too!.

 

I was reading this and thought I should share personal experience. For the older engines with well over 9 for compression the "all the way till it pings and back a touch" seems to work well but my experience for lower compression (in the 8's) is they need to go back a bit more than a touch because the point were they will ping is pretty far advanced. I had a 427 that I ran a later smog head on with a bigger chamber to reduce compression. It had some surging issues at highway speed. I chased that for a long time until I finally found that the timing was way too far up, and I still had no pinging at that point. Setting the timing back to a "normal" spec (seems to me it was around 6* or 8*) made it run proper and had no adverse effects.

Thanks for all the help! Spent my lunch hour the other day adjusting it. Turned it counter clockwise , seemed to pick up power. Ran out of time to get it to ping.