mopar777

the car was firing a week ago, but the carb was flooding itself, so i took it off and rebuilt it, brought it up to TDC and dropped the distributor in, replaced sparkplug wires. now the car wont start. it backfires through the carb no matter how much i advance it forward, mind you last week the throttle got stuck and was wide open for about 10 seconds, twice.
plugs wires are right, coils getting spark, and put it to top dead center and nothing, still backfires but no start.
its a cloyes timing chain, which ive since read bad things about.
any ideas? think the chain stretched and jumped a tooth??

help would be much appreciated

440roadrunner

Sounds like you have the distributor in what is known as "180 off." When you say you "brought up to TDC" this only occurs ONCE one every TWO crank revolutions. On the opposite crank rotation, no6 is firing instead on no1.

You need to find the "compression stroke." If you happen to have either valve cover off, look at the valves for either no1 or no6. Bring the timing marks up, and look at the valves. If you are looking at no1, they can either be both open (one opening, the other closing) which is the WRONG stroke for no1, or they can BOTH be CLOSED which is the "compressions stroke" or "no1 ready to fire." THIS is the proper position.

The second way is to pull no1 plug, stick your finger in the hole, or if a /6 or hemi, put a piece of hose down there, or use your compression gauge. Bump the engine until you START to feel compression. You may want to "go round" a couple-three times to be sure, and when you START to feel compression, look for the timing marks which you SHOULD be able to see "coming up."

Bring the engine up to 5-10* BTC or so for a "fairly stock" cam, or 10-15 BTC or so for a "fairly hot" cam. Now put the distributor in with the rotor pointing to no1

I always scribe the top of the dist. case rim directly under the no1 plug tower for reference.

Put the dist in, rotate "retard" (CW for a small block, CCW for a BB/ RB) and then slowly rotate "advanced" until the points just open or until the reluctor tip is in the center of the pickup coil. You can confirm distributor rotation by "springing" the rotor against the advance springs. A CW rotation distributor (small block) will "spring" CW and "spring back CCW." Opposite of course for a CCW rotating (BB/ RB engine)

NOTICE that we did not set the dist at TDC. This way, we have some initial advance "in" for better starting.

IF YOU DO this correctly, you should be able to fire the engine right up, no fuss, no muss.

mopar777

" Now put the distributor in with the rotor pointing to no1"
what do you mean by this? have the rotor pointing towards #1 cylinder or #1 plugwwire on dist?
when you the the process you described, when you drop the distributor in the rotor should drop in pointing directly at #1 plug wire correct?


ill try this tomorrow, maybe we got lucky the first time.

440roadrunner

The distributor will go in one of two ways. It actually does not matter so far as the engine running, WHICH way you put the dist in. The important points are:

Use the method described to get no1 on the proper stroke (crank revoloution)

Then put the dist. in and put the no1 WIRE to the tower where the rotor points.

The thing that affect so called "proper" installation is the proper positioning of the distributor drive gear (intermediate shaft). The only reason that there is a so called "proper" method is:

So the assembly line people can "wrench, repeat"

So the plug wires "lay nice"

So the tune up mechanics "see" what they expect.

otherwise, on any V8 and inline engines, you could "throw" the dist. in "any old place." You could bring up the no1 piston on compression, and wherever the rotor happens to point, plug the no 1 wire in.

Engines that "do" matter are so called "uneven fire" V6's which have 2 towers closer together, then a wide space between pairs. So moving the wires just one tower will make it run poorly.