Guest iskone Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 Que Rocky theme music!!!! I have conquered the carbs. MUHAHAHAHA It is still rigged up with the 1/2" fuel line but it is running. Timing has been a serious bitch. I've also figured out why it was backfireing last week and then ignited the filters. It won't be burning again!!! I'm really fd up with my dist. setup and I'm seriously thinking about buying an electric dist. for my 240 but in the catalog I have (VB) they are $430 Isk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bjhines Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 Hmmmm....check links on some of the Z web pages...I found plenty of distributor options for any year Z-car...I use a relatively good example of my original dist. with a pertronix module installed, hot coil, bypassed resistor, NGK plugs and wires, brass posted dist cap..I never have ignition problems...EVER! I am not at all sure that the aftermarket dist. are worth the money..I am also very leery of their reliability and repairability. Rebello may have some recurved factory dist. for sale... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 I am not at all sure that the aftermarket dist. are worth the money..I am also very leery of their reliability and repairability. Yep. That's my impression too. A ZX distributor with the vacuum advance mechanism disabled has a good timing curve with 17º advance all in at 2500 from the factory. Can't beat the price too, as they usually go for $30-$50 with the module IME. I still think your distributor setup has some serious advantages, and you should make the effort to figure it out. On a couple threads you've said that it has no advance mechanism. I'm not sure I believe that. I would bet it has centrifugal advance, and that's what you want. It should be as easy as getting a timing light with the advance funtion, setting it to 35º, revving the engine to 3000 rpm and lining the timing light up to the 0º mark. That should be it. I don't honestly understand why this is causing so many problems for you. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iskone Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 Yep. That's my impression too. A ZX distributor with the vacuum advance mechanism disabled has a good timing curve with 17º advance all in at 2500 from the factory. Can't beat the price too' date=' as they usually go for $30-$50 with the module IME. I still think your distributor setup has some serious advantages, and you should make the effort to figure it out. On a couple threads you've said that it has no advance mechanism. I'm not sure I believe that. I would bet it has centrifugal advance, and that's what you want. It should be as easy as getting a timing light with the advance funtion, setting it to 35º, revving the engine to 3000 rpm and lining the timing light up to the 0º mark. That should be it. I don't honestly understand why this is causing so many problems for you.[/quote'] Well I've taking the dist. apart and I didn't see a way to set a curve. Take a look at this link and tell me if you can see anything that would be an advance. http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=100374 I just have the basic $20 dollar timing light. Normally I set the motor to TDC then move the wheel with the timing marks to 35* and line that up #1 on the cap. For some reason when I do that now it needs to be advanced from there quite a bit. Doesn't make sense but it's working. I too don't thnik I should have so many problems with the timing, maybe I'm a moron. I have taking the cap off to double check that the timing marks and the rotor are both on 0* I won't give up yet but I'm getting very frustrated. As far as prolems go I think part of the starting problem is due to me having no chokes on my Webers and after a bit of cranking my battery gets tired. I may also try this other starter that I have. You don't think My battery could have too much CCA for my starter do you? 800CCA 1000CA Optima Red Top. Isaac Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 The mechanical advance would be inside the distributor, underneath the plate with the slots. Real easy way to check for mechanical advance: with the distributor installed and the belt on, grab the rotor and twist. If it moves at all, then you're moving the advance mechanism. It's sprung so it might be hard to twist. Here's a picture of the centrifugal advance mechanism that's been pulled out of a ZX dizzy: When you pull the cap off and look at the distributor you can't see any of this mechanism since it's under the breaker plate. There is normally no adjustment to set your timing curve on a distributor. Usually it requires changing springs or soldering up the slots inside the distributor. You probably don't have to mess with the curve anyway. I would imagine that anyone who would go through the hassle to set that distributor up already has the curve set. I don't understand what you're doing with the timing at all. I've never had a pulley that was marked all the way around, but I would imagine that if 0º is set at 0, then 35º advance should be 330º, unless the pulley is marked backwards. I think this might be your problem. 35º BEFORE top dead center is what you want, I think you've been going to 35º AFTER TDC. Regardless, I would bet you dollars to donuts that you have mechanical advance on that dizzy, so I wouldn't set it to 330º either, because then it won't want to idle and it will ping like crazy. My suggestion would be to set everything back to 0º and buy a timing light that does have the advance feature. Probably not the most accurate, but here's one for $30: http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=40963 If you don't want to do that, I would guess that you could set the timing at idle to something like 357º on your wheel (should be 8º BTDC) and then advance just a little bit at a time until you like what how it feels and it doesn't ping. If I'm right on the timing thing then it should fire up a lot easier. BTW the battery doesn't matter. You could have 1,000,000 CCA, and the starter will only take what it needs from those 1,000,000. You really don't need chokes on Webers. Just give it a good pump on the gas pedal and then turn the key, and it should fire just fine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted June 6, 2005 Share Posted June 6, 2005 I just looked at your link again and it looks like your distributor is spinning backwards, because of the way it is located on the engine. You can tell because the cap is marked for the wires, but the markings are wrong, and you have written the correct firing order with a marker. I think this means that 35º on the pulley should be 35º BTDC. So either get the timing light or start messing with it from about 8º on the degree wheel and see what happens. Are you timing it based on that mark you made on the distributor housing? Are you sure that the mark you made is in the right place? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iskone Posted June 8, 2005 Share Posted June 8, 2005 I just looked at your link again and it looks like your distributor is spinning backwards' date=' because of the way it is located on the engine. You can tell because the cap is marked for the wires, but the markings are wrong, and you have written the correct firing order with a marker. I think this means that 35º on the pulley should be 35º BTDC. So either get the timing light or start messing with it from about 8º on the degree wheel and see what happens. Are you timing it based on that mark you made on the distributor housing? Are you sure that the mark you made is in the right place?[/quote'] You are correct about the distributor wheel. When the cap is off I just spin the wheel to point where I want it to fire and you can see the rotor move in front of the #1 electrode. I'm going to look into the advance timing light and see if it helps. What you said in your previous post is basically what I had to do this last time around. It's a PITA. I don't use the mark on the distributor housing as the mark I go by for timing. I use the one on the distributor cap. Even it my mark is a little off it doesn't matter since I can spin the distributor to make up the difference. I keep thinking there is no advance because if I set it for say 20* when at 3krpm then I give it gas all seems well untill I get on the road then it pings. I'm gonna try to post some pics tonight with some more detail about how I get everything setup and how the whole setup works. If I can't get this solved I very well might go with a ZX dizzy because I've got 1 week before I go in for surgery on my arm, sidelining me for at least 6 weeks. In that case I might just put my setup on the chopping block. I'd to do that though. Isaac Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JMortensen Posted June 8, 2005 Share Posted June 8, 2005 I keep thinking there is no advance because if I set it for say 20* when at 3krpm then I give it gas all seems well untill I get on the road then it pings. Most common reasons for ping: TOO MUCH ADVANCE or TOO LITTLE OCTANE. If it's pinging that means that it is advancing too much when you accelerate past 3K, when the advance is probably just coming all in. It definitely isn't pinging because there is no advance. Quite the opposite. So what I think you've been doing is retarding the crap out of it to keep it from pinging. That's not good. Retarded timing puts a lot of heat into the exhaust, can warp exhaust valves, etc. I'm gonna try to post some pics tonight with some more detail about how I get everything setup and how the whole setup works. If I can't get this solved I very well might go with a ZX dizzy because I've got 1 week before I go in for surgery on my arm, sidelining me for at least 6 weeks. In that case I might just put my setup on the chopping block. I'd to do that though. If you can't get to a dyno, then set timing at idle to 10º or as close as you can get. Then tweak it up until you're comfortable that you won't be getting any ping, and hopefully you won't be losing too much power. I wonder what your engine would do with some 100 octane fuel. You'd probably be able to run an appropriate amount of total advance (~35º) and get a lot more power out of it. If you decide to go ZX dizzy, I'll swap you mine which already has the vacuum advance disabled, plus a bit of cash if you want. I really think you should be able to get what you've got working though. I think you just had the advance and ping thing screwed up. More advance or too low octane = ping. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iskone Posted June 8, 2005 Share Posted June 8, 2005 Yeah, I've considered this all being to little octane but when I first bought the car I just filled it up with 92 on more than one ocasion. The other day tough I had about 6-7 gallons of 92 and added 1 gallon of xylene to if if I could stop the ping on hard acceleration, Did not with 95 octane. Today I put in more 8 more gallons of 92 and it seemed to ping a little worse. I only drove a short distance so I couldn't say for sure. I did as much as one could do as far as getting an accurate cr measurement and I'm at 11.6-1 Isk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iskone Posted June 16, 2005 Share Posted June 16, 2005 A little update: The car has been running with the not so great timing without any serious problems. It would still ping under hard acceleration. Friday night I race a 944 than a Mustang GT creamed them both. Afterwards the car seemed to lack power on the low end. Today on the way to work my belt slipped and my timng got better then got f'd. I reset it after work and it's better than ever. No pinging on hard acceleration at all. It seems to have less power at say 3000 but pulls harder after 4500. I'm thinking I was an idiot and had it to advanced. I'm still thinking I'm gonna go to a stock dizzy I've been looking at a few options. Use the dist in my 78' 280Z I'm not sure what the curve is. Go with the ZX dizzy What year was the one that's all in at 2500? 240 dist with a electroinc conversion John: What shape is your dizzy in? PM me. Isk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest iskone Posted June 18, 2005 Share Posted June 18, 2005 Ok I got my hands on a light with the advance function. I already have the timing in what REALLY feels like spot on. No ping under any conditon what so ever I'm getting better gas milage (a whopping 15mpg, up from 12mpg). I was out there with the new light but I don't think I was using it right (sounds stupid, because it is). Since the timing felt spot on I didn't want to do what I think is using the light the right way. I read the directions but I was confused. Tomorrows plan is to use the light how I think it should be done. I'm gonna line up the #1 spark plug post with the #0 on the degree wheel and a mark I'll make on the brackets all at TDC of course. Then set the light for 35* rev the motor to 3000 and move the dist until it lines back up with the #0 on the dist wheel. Hmm I don't if that sounds right, sh!t maybe I just won't F with it. Ehh I'll worry about then I guess. Anyway from reading the instruction manual it looks like I might be able to use one of the funtions to figure out the advance curve. Another question I have is about the accuracy of the RPM display on timing lights. Are they any good? Mine seems to jump around all over the place untill the engine is held at that speed for a few seconds and even then it seems like it wants to wander. I bought the "Pro Series" light from CSK. Maybe I should have went to West Bay/Parts Plus (in my area they are the performance orientaed parts desk) Oh and when I say spot on timing I freaking mean it!!!! I took her for a test drive tonight and she rocked hard!!! I've had her at this setting for a few days but my stupid a$$ belt that drives my dist. streched so I was affraid to rev it to high and have been trying to stay around 3500-4000 Fixed it tongiht and got on it. I was going sideways up hill shifting into thrid!!!!! Man it flet so good to open her up like that after holding back for what seems like forever. I really havn't got on it since I got her back together even when I race some fool I don't go all out, untill tonight anyway!!! Anyway enough from me I'm just so gitty about my car. Isk Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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