Thread: won't start.

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Originally posted by firebird45331
It's maker's mark, it's the best I've ever had.

thats what made me do all those things, had to quite drinking. if youre drinking vodka that early in the morning might be the reason you cant get the motor started late at nite. maybe you need to work on the motor in the morning. i know you dont want to hear this, but if its not inside the motor i bet you i can have it running in less than 15 min. just joking about this other stuff. if its making whooshing and farting sounds its out of time. which way is the rotor turning? your doing something wrong over and over. one valve out of adj. ant gonna keep it from running. i dont know.

Originally posted by Henry Rifle
Mike,

I just wandered off into Stupidville for a minute. That's in Klewless County, just south of the Whatthehay river, in the Great State of Confusion.

Like you said, I never worried about the cam after I put it in dot-to-dot. Next in line was valve adjustment, then proper distributor installation.

Kinda like driving an automatic. . . you don't need to worry about the next gear.

i was up in confusion yesterday. this is a few things i dont worry about no more.
pulling the leaver on a automatic foot brake release.
or dimming the lights on a car with auto. dimmers.
or cutting the lights off on cars with timers on the lights.
or lock or un-locking auto. door locks.
that's some of the things I don't spend a lot of time worrying about . ill bet other people on here have other little things they dont spend a lot of time think to much about it either.


firebird45331 didnt mean to jump your post. couldnt help myself. i think i got into your vodka.

Firebird, lets go through a valve adjustment to see if we can help you out on this.
Turn the engine clockwise from the front while watching the intake valve for #1 cylinder (drivers front). After you see it open AND close, watch for the timing marks to come up and stop on Top Dead Center. That is the firing position for #1 cylinder. (Good time to reasure that the distributor is pointing the right way) Loosen all the rocker arms so that there is no doubt that they are loose.
With the #1 cylinder at TDC the following valves can be adjusted: Exhaust- 1,3,4,8. Intake- 1,2,5,7.
Turn the engine one complete revolution until the timing marks are again at TDC which will put #6 cylinder in position to fire. At this time the following valves can be adjusted. Exhaust- 2,5,6,7. Intake- 3,4,6,8.
When adjusting, GENTLY wiggle the rocker while slowly tightening the nut. When you feel the wiggle BARELY go away, stop. This should be Zero lash. Then go to the next one and do the same until you go through the cycle. After you go through all of them, start at one end or the other and tighten them an adidional 1/2 turn, no more. The book calls for 3/4 turn, but I have found that used lifters tend to have a slight miss sometimes. This eliminates a lot of confusion on which ones are tightened enough or not. Should you feel like you have over tightened any of them, back it off and do it again. You can take a piece of chalk and put a mark above each rocker somewhere after you adjust it so that you don't lose your place.
Recheck the compression on the questionable cylinders for reassurance if you want. It only takes a few minutes to completely go through the adjustment. It takes longer to remove the valve covers than it takes to adjust the valves.
Ed

gently wiggle the rockers or the pushrods?

where's jeffersonville indiana?

Hi there

I agree with the guys, it sounds like the timing is resonably close, you are getting good compression on most cylinders, it should start. A couple things to check:

Is the starter motor turning it over fast enough to fire?
Is the fuel old, ie oxidised and no good, maybe set up a temporary gravity feed fuel tank with new high octane fuel?
Is the carb clear and letting air in, take air filter off and see what happens when cranking it over.
Are you getting good spark at each cylinder, ie fuel and air going in with compression, good spark will make fire even if timing is out a little bit.

I would check the easy stuff.
Justin

Firebird,
You can gently wiggle the rocker or you can take all the verticle movement out of the pushrod. the idea is to take al the movement out of the pushrod and rocker WITHOUT compressing the lifter any. ZERO LASH.
I don't know how you adjusted the valves before. I wanted to give you the correct procedure of adjusting them. By following the procedure I outlined to you, I usually always go ahead and seal the valve covers with RTV sealant (I don't use gaskets). When the enging heats up the valves will be even tighter, so no need for a 3/4 turn a that the factory recommends.
Ed

ok all adjusted and the new plugs are in. Just waiting for the battery to charge. Have a question on #5 I found my adjustment was was too loose, would that cause low compression too if the valves weren't opening enough?

most of the time if it opens at all it will get enough air to show comp. but one cylinder shouldnt keep it from running.

well I'll probably know tomorrow or later tonight after the battery is done charging. I replaced the plugs and adjusted all the lifters. hopefully this works. It doesn't matter if I set the balancer at 10 tdc or 0 does it? I set it at 10 and dropped the distributor in at #1. Guy at work told me that would make my timing off by 50 degrees. I was like wtf?

firebird45331 now that you got a min. mix you self a vodka and walk us through how you gonna start this car. starting with the TDC marks

vodka? it's about gone, got some wonderful whiskey though. as it sits now I planned on putting the battery in and cranking it. I believe it's at #6 tdc. I have the new plugs in, I double checked the wires. I have the balancer set at 10 degrees before tdc and I have the distributor pointing at #1. Well actually right now with #6 being at tdc it should be pointing at 6. I did check the pin in the distributor gear and it was there. I screwed the adjustment screws in and backed them out 2 1/2 turns. I don't know about edelbrock carbs though when it comes to cranking time. Do they need pumped? should I close the choke? As stated earlier I had to pump my old quadrajet 7 or 8 times to get it started.

untill you get that timing right it never gonna start. you have no idea where the timing is. if i sound up set i am. you can be sure about all of this before you ever turn the motor over and then you wouldnt have all this problem. im trying to tell you how to know where you timing is not guessing. go back and read what you wrote. if you will do what i tell you i belive the car will start.

Originally posted by lt1s10
untill you get that timing right it never gonna start. you have no idea where the timing is. if i sound up set i am. you can be sure about all of this before you ever turn the motor over and then you wouldnt have all this problem. im trying to tell you how to know where you timing is not guessing. go back and read what you wrote. if you will do what i tell you i belive the car will start.

Keep swingin' 'til the bell rings, Mike

Originally posted by techinspector1
Keep swingin' 'til the bell rings, Mike

im gonna start this car one way or another firebird45331 dont make me come up there.