I have some questions about this old car of mine. First of all, I am not a mechanic,but am begginning to understand more and more about how engines work. 1st ,What body style is the plymouth furyIII? 2nd, If the number on my intake ends with 383,does that mean it is 383? Also , I just found out the importance of having to change or set the points. I changed them and the rotor and the plug wires and the distributor cap. Once it was running, I went to set the timing. With the timing lite lead conected to the no. 1, I get no strobe. When I check for spark from that plug wire by holding near ground, there is no spark. All other wires from the distributor have spark. Every time I ask someone who would know, they all say that changing all of the parts that I changed should have fixed it . Any opinions. I appreciate any advice.

 

Welcome to the forum. The Fury is a C body.

 

Thanks DDodge

 

i would think the part number means 383. i usually check the side of the block. or under the drivers side head in the front..is ur distributor in the front or rear? if its in the rear its a small block. front=big block...if it has a pad of metal in front of the intake on the block its a "rb" 413 426 440.family...no pad its a "B" 350 361 383 400 family....they do have a 383 rb but not that yr,, and with the missing spark maybe the dist bearings are bad? is there side to side slop?

 

66, When I had the distributor bolt loose to try and adjust timing, I was able to move the distributor a little from side to side. Is that what you mean by side to side slop? So what do I do? Do I need to replace the distrubutor? Distributor is in the back. Ill have to look again at the intake. dont know about the metal pad in front of intake to help identify. Thanks

 

dist in the back means its a small block if it has 2 bolts thru the valve covers its a 318 A engine. (wide block) (poly)("baby hemi") not a LA block (Light A 5 bolts in the flange of the valve covers) no what i mean is pop the cap remove the rotor and see if the rotor shaft moves side to side. or the lobe in the dist could be quite worn.. any electronic dist from a small block will work 273,318,360.. check out www.procompelectronics.com they are inexpensive and a few mags do say good things about there heads and intakes.

 

if the distributor is in the back, it is not a 383
you have a C body
post a pic of the engine

 

I will post a pic tommorrow. Thanks

 

Thanks 67 GTX and 66. Ill check the dist for play and also try to figure out how to get a pic on here

 

It's likely to be a 273 or 318 Poly, both have the distributor in the back. If you have a wire with no spark, you likely have a bad connection at the wire where in connects to the distributor cap (the inner wire may not be attached properly to the metal clip inside the boot). To verify if this is the problem, simply swap the #1 wire with the #2 wire. If you still don't get a spark at #1, then your distributor cap is bad. If #2 now has no spark, all you need is a new wire (or to repair the connection in your existing wire).

There should be no play in your distributor if it is properly bolted down, though it will probably be possible to wiggle the cap if you push on it hard enough. Remember to unhook your vacuum advance hose (if you have a vacuum advance distributor) to insure a correct timing light reading (make sure to plug the hose). Also, remember that changing the timing will change the idle, and the mechanical advance system in the distributor will also affect timing light readings if the idle speed is not at factory specs. A higher idle speed will advance the timing, giving you a false reading.