Understanding Timing

[EverydayDiesel]

I am currently reading the starlite book and so far so good but it got me thinking...

How exactly does the diesel engine control timing? From what little I know about these engines, I understand them to be a slow burn with no real explosion (compared to a gasser with spark plugs)
It seems that diesel under pressure causes it to ignite and timing is more a function of when the fuel is sprayed but I could be wrong.

Under what conditions do you want advance timing, TDC timing and after TDC timing?

Some of you fellers that are way more knowledgeable then me chime in to help me understand 'timing' in the diesel engine.

[2007 5.9]

Timing is when the fuel is injected and duration is how long the injector is open. The latter helps you determine the former based on rpm

Negative timing is useful for low end power plus spool.

Positive timing is useful for making power once the turbo/s are lit.

[EverydayDiesel]

Does this mean on my soon to be compound setup 363/477 that the whole table should be positive? I have yet to drive a compound setup but from what I understand it spools VERY fast

[2007 5.9]

I wouldn't suggest the entire table being BTDC...I will still have some ATDC timing in the low end to start then adjust as you drive to keep spool up and smoke down

[EverydayDiesel]

Is this too much timing for my stock 6.7? Any feedback you can give me on my first edit would be greatly appreciate it.

This is stock
http://i1056.photobucket.com/albums/t363/everydaydiesel2/stock%20timing_zpsdqk0nkzi.png

My edited timing
http://i1056.photobucket.com/albums/t363/everydaydiesel2/edited%20timing_zpsm1hn3mkr.png

Timing calculator after editing.
http://i1056.photobucket.com/albums/t363/everydaydiesel2/timing%20calculator_zps8xouaw57.png

[2007 5.9]

Quite a bit of a d advanced timing in the low end...might not be very responsive

[EverydayDiesel]

When you say low end I assume you are talking about rpm?

One area I am not sure about is 150@1700 rpm as that is a pretty big change due to the smoothing. I am not sure if that is too much or not.

[2007 5.9]

You'll never see 150mm3@1700rpm....