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Won't start after a winter's worth or repairs: Eye candy while I wait for parts

well, it's got a Holley 80457 with electric choke. the choke never moved as far as i could tell, except to let out a puff of white vapor when the engine died.

i'm currently trying to start it while jumper-cabled to my dad's running truck, so it has plenty of juice. i tried the timing light while just cranking, but the strobe was so slow i couldn't make out the timing mark. i guess i should go back and try that again.

i didn't put new studs in, just pulled the rockers and rods to remove the heads, then put them back, tightening the nuts until i couldn't turn the rods with my fingers, then added another 1/2 turn (for each cylinder just rocking). i re-did the rockers twice to make sure i did it right (wasn't quite sure of the whole "turn with your fingers" thing), and i'm sure i did. other than wire-wheeling the valve faces with a soft wheel on my dremel (heavy carbon deposits), i didn't touch the valves. could i have screwed up the valve train?
 
doubtful. You rotated the motor as you did the rockers right? OR did you adjust them all with the engine left in one spot?

Also, have you re checked your firing order?
 
yeah, i rotated the engine 90* at a time from tdc, doing each cylinder as it rocked. i'm 99% sure i did that right. as for the firing order, i've had to pull the wires to get the valve covers off so many times now that i could have screwed something up. i'll double check that before i go any further.

thanks for the help everyone. hopefully i'll have some time to work on it more next weekend, but for now i have to focus on school. i've got two more weeks of hell before finals, so i doubt i'll have much time for truck stuff.
 
Update

Ok, so i finally got out of school and have some time to play with this thing again. I've quadruple-checked the firing order, and made sure all the plugs are connected well. first time i started it up, it fired up great and idled roughly. checking the timing, i was at 35* advance at 500rpm idle. rotating the dist clockwise, i got to about 25* before it needed me on the throttle to keep going. at that point, the timing mark was jumping around so much i was hard to read, as was the tach needle. There's still a horrible squeal/whine coming from the engine that i assume to be pinging.

I searched online, and it seems like i could be off a tooth with my distributor installation. The engine runs best when the distributor is turned as far counterclockwise as it can go, hitting the vacuum port on the intake with the vacuum advance canister. It's a brand new HEI, so i doubt there's anything wrong with the dist itself. The problem is, there seems to be a disagreement about whether a distributor can be off a tooth or not. some say yes, some say only for non-HEI types, and some say its an urban legend.

Before i go pulling the dist (and probably my plugs, belts and valve cover(s) to get TDC) is it possible that i'm off a tooth? Advancing the timing by rotating the dist counter-clockwise improves the engine's idle, so i figure if i'm reading 35* at that point, i might be off 45*. Could i be so far off that i could move the plug wires all over one spot counterclockwise and get the same result? :dunno:

I sure wish i understood this stuff better...
 
35* advance at idle??? Yikes!

I could see maybe 5 maybe 8 at most. you've got something else going on there, other than messed up timing. I'd say distributor is a tooth off or so, like you spoke of earlier.
 
OK, couple of things. Pinging sounds like its written. It sounds like someone is hitting something in the engine with a small hammer.
Maybe better described as a rattling sound.
Once you hear it, its unmistakable.

There is no part of it that I have ever heard described as squealing. If you hear a squeal, that might be part of your problem.

As for finding TDC, you don't have to pull the valve covers.
Just pull the no. 1 plug. The piston reaches TDC twice per cycle. If you use the wrong one, the engine will not fire, but will backfire through the intake. Its called being 180 degrees out.

Remember, the dist. rotates once for each two engine revolutions.
Either bump the engine around with the coil wire grounded, or move it some way. When the mark gets close to the TDC mark, put your finger over the sparkplug hole in number 1.
When you hit the TDC you want to set the dist at, you will feel lots of pressure. If you don't feel pressure, you are at the wrong TDC. Just bump it around to the next one.

In your case, the dist. is obviously set to the correct one, since it runs. So, there is no need to determine which is which.
Just pull the cap off, bump the engine around to a TDC mark and look at the rotor.

It will be pointing either towards the no. 1 position or directly away from it. If it pointing towards it, look close. It should be exactly at the no. 1 position when the pointer on the block is at TDC.
Of course, you may have to turn the dist slightly to line it up.

If you have to crank it a long ways around to make it line up, then you are a tooth off.
Turn the dist. back to about the center of its adjustment, lift it out, and turn the rotor to the no.1 position, and then try to ease it back in.

Note: If the timing mark keeps jumping around when everything is set right, you may need a timing chain change.
 
great. i'll get it to tdc and make sure the rotor is set right. I'm pretty sure the timing jumping around was from the rough idle; it only started jumping once i had to play with the throttle to keep it running. I'll be back on once i figure out what's going on.
 

I dont know if it will help or not, the guy sounds like a bit of a know it all, but none the less he is talking instead of typing. There is a part 2 and 3 also. Couple of the related videos are good too. Something im not sure if anyone mentioned, was that perhaps the harmonic ballancer could be messed up. MAy there needs to be a piston stop involved to find out if the TDC mark on the balancer is actually the TDC of the motor.
 
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Double check, the movie didn't show up.
You're right about the balancer. It may be the TDC mark that is off. That squeal worries me too. I'm hoping its just his interpretation of the sound.
 
MassMan said:
well, i tried to set the timing with a friend today. he doesn't know how to use a timing light, so i had him on the gas trying to keep the thing running. at the lowest RPM we could keep it running at it was 20* advance TDC. turning the distributor clockwise to retard the timing, the engine died and wouldn't start again. i barely nudged the distributor, so i brought it back to the 45* across the engine starting position, and the truck started again. turning it counter clockwise this time, it also died. at the initial position, the engine runs extremely rough and belches black smoke that smells of unburnt gas, and will die without someone holding their foot on the gas. large volumes of vapor come out of the carb and tail pipes when it is shut off. also, there is an awful sound coming from the engine when is running or being cranked. it's a cross between a chirp and a squeal, and happenes in time with the flashes from the timing light. The sound is much louder than the engine when running.

i'm scared that the noise is something major failing. could it be related to the starting issue? would a carb that dumps too much fuel be causing the problems? the truck ran very rich before i tore it down, and it also had some plug wires switched. i'm afraid that maybe the PO had compensated for this problem by tweaking all of this. i'm getting really sick of spending hours getting nowhere on this truck. if i can't get it by next week i'm towing it to a shop to have fixed. even if that would use up all my rust repair money, i need this to run before i can fix it up further.
Click to expand...

You may have the dizzy 180 degrees off, I've seen that happen and it can sound really funny and make funny noise and barely run. When you do the thumb in over the spark plug hole make sure you turn the engine over at least 2 revolutions, sometimes it can feel like there is compression on the off stroke, until you feel the real one.
 
yeah, i watched that and about a million other videos on youtube. they helped, and i did everything he mentions. as for the harmonic balancer, i had the heads off and set TDC then, and the timing mark lined up perfectly. i've since checked tdc over and over, both bumping and with the valve covers off, so i know the timing marks are correct. i doubt that's the issue.
 
well, the dist is not 180* off. i just set it at TDC and pulled the cap, the rotor's pointing towards the front of the engine. set at the point where it runs (35* and hitting the vacuum port) the rotor points WELL away from the #1 point (clockwise from it). i can rotate the dist body such that the rotor lines up with #1, but that means the vacuum advance canister is parallel with the firewall and the cap's wire input is 45* across the engine on the driver's side. i tried starting it again, and it won't start unless it's rotated counter clockwise back to the original position. i'll post pics once i re-size them
 
pics

here we go. first is the way it's set when it runs but with 35* advance:
IMG_0001.JPG

and without a cap:
IMG_0004.JPG

and this is with the rotor aligned with the #1 point:
IMG_0012.JPG

IMG_0014.JPG

i also made a video of me trying to start it with the "correct" timing set and then starting it with the 35* location set. it's crappy but it includes a good sample of the whine i hear when its running. i'll try to figure out how to upload that at some point.

IMG_0001.JPG

IMG_0004.JPG

IMG_0012.JPG

IMG_0014.JPG
 
here's another shot of the "correct" timing set. you can see the '1' i engraved on the dist body:

IMG_0013.JPG

IMG_0013.JPG
 
Quick thought on your "whine" noise... Are you low on trans fluid? Years ago I swapped motors and in the process, I lost some trans fluid. Over the weeks it took me to get the car back together again I forgot to top off my trans. It made one he'll of a whining noise that I swore was coming from my new motor...
 
could be... the trans pan has a hell of a leak that i've had on my to-do list. last i checked the level was ok though. i'll check that once i can figure out how to get my video up on youtube.
 
Looking at your last photo, I think your #1 is in the wrong spot... But I'm going off memory here, I thought your # 1 should be one wire position counterclockwise.
 
really? i followed the "how to rebuild your small block chevy" book's diagram. i'll double check
 
it looks like 4 is over the vacuum advance, ad then 8 then 1 going counterclockwise. it looks right to me
 
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