I recently bought a rebuilt motor for my Pinto, it's a 2.3L. When I got the motor there was no distributor, and the timing belt was not installed. I have the motor running desent, I'm getting pretty good gas milage (about 21mpg), but there still seems to be a slight miss when at an idle, and a hesitation when I try to accelerate slowly. I found out that you can't just drop the distributor in and point it to the #1 cylinder by trial and error and I can't find anything that tells you where to set the distributor gear when setting the timing if the distributor has been removed. Does anyone have any ideas on this, or does it sound like I'm barking up the wrong tree here.
Quote from: jcbugs on February 18, 2006, 01:10:15 AM
I recently bought a rebuilt motor for my Pinto, it's a 2.3L. When I got the motor there was no distributor, and the timing belt was not installed. I have the motor running desent, I'm getting pretty good gas milage (about 21mpg), but there still seems to be a slight miss when at an idle, and a hesitation when I try to accelerate slowly. I found out that you can't just drop the distributor in and point it to the #1 cylinder by trial and error and I can't find anything that tells you where to set the distributor gear when setting the timing if the distributor has been removed. Does anyone have any ideas on this, or does it sound like I'm barking up the wrong tree here.
What fool told you that?
As long as you have the timming belt installed and tight.
Dropping the dist is the same as any other engine.
Your engine must be timmed with a light after mechanical timming is done.
You have addressed a good question,
Seems that ewvery engine I have had or built does the same thing.
An intermitent miss while idling.
As I do not usually build stock engines.. I just count it off to the carb loading up.
Looking for an answer TOO!
From Pintony
Maybe I should clarify this further.
Both Chilton manuals that I have say that to replace the timing belt, line up timing marks on the crank and camshaft to their correct spots and point the rotor in the distributor to the #1 spot on the distributor cap. When I first installed the distributor I just pushed it in and made sure the rotor poined to the #1 mark on the cap.
When I did this I could only get the engine to run decent if I set my idle very high, and advance the timing by around 15 deg. The main problem here was I was getting terrible gas milage, about 15 MPG. Someone then told me that my distributor might be off by "a tooth or two". I took it all back apart to discover that if you turn the distributor gear, it appears to have some sort lobe in it, it turns evenly for most of a rotation, then a slight "catch", then smooth again. When I re-installed the distributor the second time I installed it right at the point where the gear turns "smooth". This corrected the problems with advancing the timing and the high idle speed but it still leaves me with the hesitation and slight miss at idle speed. The engines timing has always been set with a timing light after making any adjustments. I'm wondering if there is a setting on that "lobe" that would correct these issues. Should I be installing the distributor before, in the middle of, or after this "lobe" in the gear. Maybe I should just be happy that it is running very good and getting decent gas milage, but something in my head is telling me that I could be getting even better milage if I could clear up these very minor issues.
I would say that is impossible to have the dist off 1 or 2 teeth.
If you have the pointer pointing at #1 then as long as you can turn the housing enough to get the timing light settings done then you are where you need to be.
THrow the spec out the window and time your engine to the most advance you can run W.O getting spark knock under hard acceleration.
This will give you the best milage.
BUT MAYBE not the best possible performance.
To do the timming right you need an adjustable timming light.
one that can tell you how much total advance you have.
A stock Pinto should have 33-34 deg. total advance.
To get optimal performance you will need to find out where you are at idle and then go to about 3000 rpm to see what total advance is.
If this does not work out you will need to dis assemble your dist. and bend a tang inside for more or less total advance.
For a STOCK 2.3 this step is usually totally un-nessisary.
A stock Pinto 2.3 Wagon will only get about what you are getting 21 MPG actually I'm suprised that your doing that well.
How Much are you coasting in neutrtal? ;D
From Pintony
coast? what's that. I don't think I ever drive under 70MPH. 60 miles a day all highway.
Thanks Pintony
OK... NOW think back to when the speed limit was 55.
Go that speed and I'll bet you get 30MPG ;D
70MPH I'm amazed you get 15MPG.
From Pintony
I drive 23 miles one way to work every day, mostly freeway, around 65-70 mph, and I'm geeting between 23 and 25. I agree with Tony about your timing though, just set it where it runs best under hard, not full throttle, bit hard accel.