Okay, I was trying to change the timing belt on my 2.3 Pinto. I accidentally bumped the crank while wrestling the old belt off. I put it back to where I thought it was and put the new belt on. Now Wee Beastie barely runs. I believe that I'm off a cog or two. I'm going to look at it on my next day off.
Sooo..... If I get the dampener pointer at TC, the cam pointer at the dot, and the distributor rotor pointing at the other dot, I should be okay, right?
Maybe, but it depends how it was installed the last time. IF someone installed it "wrong" and compensated by moving all the plug wires, then no, it won't work.
Set the Cam and Crank pullies to their marks, pull off the dist. cap and line up the rotor to the #1 plug wire by turning the Aux. shaft.
Double check you ignition timing.
Bill
if u have a old dist. cap snap off the #1 tower so you can see where the rotor is pointing and if its on number 1 thats what i did just be carful putting on the timing belt so you dont move any thing around
And if you have ANY doubts about the correct cam vs crank timing position, or something looks to be in the wrong position when you are ready to install the timing belt, just remember that on a 4 stroke engine such as this one, the valves on #1 cylinder should both be completely closed when the piston is physically all the way up (TDC) on the COMPRESSION stroke, and the distributor rotor should also pointing to #1 spark plug. So, with the valve cover off, the #1 piston all the way up, the distributor cap off, and the timing belt off you can easily check for all 3 of these before reinstalling the timing belt.
I took the cover off and the cam timing turned out okay. It merely turned out that the distributor was out of whack. It needed turned clockwise. Is that advancing or retarding? Dialed it in to 20° BTC and it seems to be running better than ever.