Interesting timing issues on my carb conversion

[crazypete]

The car would not start, so I pulled everything emission control related off. Suddenly, she started sputtering. So I guess I killed a vacuum leak on the egr riser plate. I then pulled and plugged the vacuum hose leading to the distributor (a vacuum advance duraspark II dist off a 79' ford) and had my dad crank it while I set the timing to 10 btdc (the stock setting).

Now here's the funny part. I can start it if crank and pump the gas with the vacuum advance disconnected and it will run as long as I keep pumping on the gas. If I stop, it will sputter, sputter, die. I see a little "water" behind the tailpipes. Now, if I connect the vacuum advance, it goes crazy. I can barely get it to sputter and it starts to detonate. Black smoke out back and some coming up through the carb. Should I be using the efi base timing? She kinda sounds like the timing is way off.