What is your question?
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What is your question?
Engine running fine until distributor shaft broke. Plugs fire but moving firing sequence one terminal in either direction is over retarded or advanced. Dist. drive will only go in one location and can't be out of time. Am I missing something with set-up that isn't obvious?
2 Replies
Cant turn dist. enough to get it in time? I know it has limited travel. Wonder why the shaft broke?
Timing chain jumped , when distributor shaft broke? Check free-play in crank pulley by turning it clockwise untill dist. rotor moves , then turn it counter-clockwise until the rotor moves again. If the amount of slop in the chain would make up for the amount the timing is off , then it's probably time for a chain and tensioner and guides.......1993-how many miles on it?
I got a used distributor from junkyard and it runs perfectly. Boggles my mind with the new (not rebuilt) distributors. Thanks for the help but since I had tried everything offered here, I had to throw another $100 to see if that would work...and it did? I rebuilt the engine 30K miles ago and had run perfect. Still don't know circumstances of fault because son was driving when it happen. Said he shut it off and it wouldn't start back up. Thanks for the help.
Did the people that sold you the new parts mention it is two possibilities? Oh well what ever as long as it's running.
Funny you should mention that. The parts house doesn't want to give me money back although they offered a third distributor. I've been an auto tech since 70's, have degree in Electronics and thought I had seen it all. Only thing I can figure is MAYBE the ECU and new ignition module are incompatible. If I can't get my money back, I'm going to start swapping parts to see if I can isolate problem because I'm baffled. I wanted my old distributor back but told me it had been returned for core. That was kinda fishy to me because normally on a new item there is no core charge etc. It drives me nuts just to throw parts at something and not understand the root of the problem. If I figure out where the gremlin lies, I'll post...even if it's my own stupidity. LOL
That does sound strange, core on a new part! I know what you mean about just throwing on a part and it works, like to know why! Did you try your old cap on the new dist.? They used 2 different types,think one was actually a mitsubishi, i think. Back in the day worked on a few of these, good little engine! Head gasket blown between 3&4 was common, or was it 1&2? Was doing a head job once, had a piece of heater hose stuck down between the chain to keep tensioner from popping out, buddy came in the shop saw it and pulled it out and said look at this it was sticking down in the motor! I let him know why, should have made him pay for pulling it all the way down in front to put the plunger back. Sorry for the rant, not many times we get to relay with another mechanic.
I was a GM tech until I "discovered" Toyota dealership that cared about the service dept and took care of techs etc. When I rebuilt the Nissan I had trouble keeping the tensioner in place and a much younger friend showed me your trick (sorta same way - so you can teach an old dawg new tricks!). I had the head resurfaced and the block decked because of the potential problem with head gaskets. I haven't tried old cap but I think I still have it. I put new cap and rotor on this old one I picked up. Another friend told me that it's possible the new distributor is indexed wrong (or different) and I would have to take the oil pan off to re-index the drive for distributor. I just keep thinking that can't be right and I don't want to take the oil pan off either! Plus when I was checking timing, #1 lined up perfectly with TDC (accounting for timing advance) on compression. It will drive me crazy until I figure this out. Something is different between the old and new distributor and I can't see any difference what so ever but I don't believe in Santa Claus. I'm almost as flustered that it fired right up with a 150K distributor as I was when the new ones wouldn't work!
I know it really dont matter but if you figure it out let us know. Have a good one, gotta go turn a few, just help a buddy now sorta part time. Used to run my own shop but just got burnt out doing it every day and then at home too for family and friends, i am sure you know all about that! Been doing this a loooong time myself. Oh, the indexing thing is a good possibiliy also, only thing that makes any sense. Which leads me to think the new unit may not have been new, cant say.
It has no means to adjust shaft alignment with crank. Dist. shaft has female receptacle for male "D" drive. It has slotted adjustment for fine tuning adv/retart with distributor body. Will not start but when advancing firing order by one terminal has symptoms of over advanced i.e. hard to crank over and occasional spit-back through intake. Opposite with retard. It's like it's a "half of tooth" off. Slot adjustment is not enough to compensate.
Put #1 at TDC compression stroke, is rotor pointing to where #1 will be on cap?? IF not possible oil pump or pump drive problem, crank drives pump, pump shaft turns the dist. If it is pointing to #1, then put wires in order, start the engine and set timing! 1-3-4-2 CCW. Still wonder what broke the old dist. shaft, was it hard to turn when it was removed? Know one more trick, if needed.
Is it a card trick?
Yep, seems that is exactly what it needed!