MSD dist. ?

[rod]

a friend gave me a good but old MSD dist. appears to an early one. cast I think. any way 1 wire from the pickup is different color from the MSD wiring book colors. I called MSD tech, and the guy said MSD never made a pickup with those colors. they are black with an orange stripe and black with a purple stripe. he said if it is connected wrong it will retard the timing. I put it in my engine. purple to purple at the MSD 7, and green to orange. the engine runs.
so, my ? is, and lets assume the retard is 10 degrees. if I set the timing at 20, is it really 30 retarded 10 showing 20 or is it showing 20 but really 10? or is it really a true 20.

the pickup is blue if that makes any diff.
thanks Rod in AZ

[L.Fite]

Check timing the way you have it installed...
Swap the wires and recheck timing...

[JP1738]

Seems to me if you are checking timing by reading the plug wire, whatever your timing gun flashes and shows you, is what it is. Regardless of if it's retarded or not, the total timing will be what you see.