Turned over and started briefly so I attached and adjusted the linkage and put the muffler on. Now all it does is cough backfire while cranking.
All was fine and I just replaced my pressure plate. Carbs (44 weber) came off and new gaskets went on...I did notice the 3,4 side was hotter then 1,2.
Ideas?
Replies sorted oldest to newest
First thing I would check is dizzy wires 1 - 4 - 3 - 2 , followed by your coil connections.....
I was just thinking I must have some wires crossed. I was trying to work and get my car back together and obviously missed something simple. I do better with a beer and no time restraints...
Thanks Doc, I'll sleep better knowing where to start in the morning.
Should look like this:
success!
I'm guessing 1 & 2 were mixed up?
Yup and I feel silly...
I went to high school with an obnoxious non-motorhead whose parents gave him a Corvette for his senior year as an incentive to go to college (but he never did). Some of us (not me, of course) would, from time to time, pop the hood on his 'Vette and swap the plug wires around, just for yucks.
I saw him at the last reunion I went to (20 years ago) and he hadn't changed any.
Glad you're set to ride, Bill!
Gordon Nichols posted:...I saw him at the last reunion I went to (20 years ago) and he hadn't changed any...
His 'Vette still had a bad misfire?
crhemi (Bill) poboiinhawaii posted:Yup and I feel silly...
Anybody who says it's never happened to them is lying, so don't worry about it. It happens, and you got it fixed. It'll never live on like Lane and the brass thingie, but we may will tease you about it for awhile! 
Al
ALB posted:crhemi (Bill) poboiinhawaii posted:Yup and I feel silly...
Anybody who says it's never happened to them is lying, so don't worry about it. It happens, and you got it fixed. It'll never live on like Lane and the brass thingie, but we may will tease you about it for awhile!
The "Brass Thingy" will go down in SOC history!
crhemi (Bill) poboiinhawaii posted:Yup and I feel silly...
Don't feel bad, Bill...ya got it done. I was having trouble getting a hole saw thru and inch of plywood on the boat today and got my helper to finish the cut. I was in an awkward position and without my glasses. Turns out that the drill was in reverse...
David Stroud posted:crhemi (Bill) poboiinhawaii posted:Yup and I feel silly...
Don't feel bad, Bill...ya got it done. I was having trouble getting a hole saw thru and inch of plywood on the boat today and got my helper to finish the cut. I was in an awkward position and without my glasses. Turns out that the drill was in reverse...
Now that's funny! Thanks again gang.
Shake down cruise went well, she runs like a top and #3 never made it to 300*...
"The "Brass Thingy" will go down in SOC history!" 
Ya gotta admit that it WAS awfully tough to diagnose. Not to mention the joy I have brought you all by providing such amusement. 
...and a cleaned out garage in the search process :~)
Lane Anderson posted:"The "Brass Thingy" will go down in SOC history!"
Ya gotta admit that it WAS awfully tough to diagnose. Not to mention the joy I have brought you all by providing such amusement.
It was like an Agathe Christie novel.
... and then-- out of the blue-- the crucial bit of information comes out after the mystery is solved.
It was (and is) pretty entertaining to remember, though.
....then there is case of cranking the motor until the battery labors, over to the bench to get the battery charger & locate rotor .... the Rotor .........WHAT ?????
Gordon...Years ago when I worked as a mechanic we had a guy we worked with that always bragged about how fast his Ford was. It was a 390 or 427 or something like that. We popped the hood at lunch time and made sure plug wire numbers 7 and 8 were parallel and as close as we could inconspicuously put them together. Since 7 and 8 fired in sequence there would be crossfire by induction around 5k RPM. The guy shut up for a long time until he figured out what was going on....Ahhh...Peace and quiet.
Bruce
Back around 1970 I had a summer job driving new school buses from the factory in North Carolina up to New England to their dealers. Usually the buses were GM or Ford based, which had governors on them holding you below 60mph, but once in a while we would get an International Harvester with no governor. We would fly down, getting to Highpoint, NC, around 10pm, check out the bus and hit the road, driving straight through and getting back to Massachusetts by 6pm the next night.
One time I got not only an International Harvester, but with a 455 cubic inch V8 to boot. "Whoo-Hoo! This bus is gonna FLY!" I thought when I checked it out.
Only that didn't happen. THIS bus couldn't pull your hat off. THIS bus could barely get to 50mph. THIS bus had a really hard time pulling up anything steeper than a mild hill. "HOLY CARP!" I thought (we said things like "Holy Carp" back then)......This thing Sucks! At this rate, it'll take me two or three DAYS to get home!
The other two guys with me, each in his own bus to be delivered, hung in with me for a while, but when it seemed like it was moving OK, albeit slowly, they chose to drive on at their own speed and I was left alone. Me and the darkness and my BIG Honkin' IH bus with no balls.
One of our regular gas stops was at a big truck stop in Troutville, Virginia on I-81, and we usually got there around 3 am. I came limping in just after 4 am, fueled up and pulled over to the side of the parking area, under a light. Just for the hell of it, I thought I would take a look under the hood to see if anything was obviously wrong, so I pop the hood and look in to see something that looked like "Fourth of July" fireworks - There are sparks flying all over the place! Most of them were between plug wires and the engine had this strange rocking going on.
So I write down what I see as a firing order and walk way over to the Truck Service area and find one of the mechanics, a scruffy-looking guy with a greasy, beat-up "Caterpillar" hat on and sporting maybe three, tobacco-stained teeth and I say, "Does anyone here know the firing order of an International Harvester 455 V-8"? The guy looks me up and down (obviously, one of them "Yankee" kids with them Bermuda shorts and Topsiders on) and with a thick southern drawl says; "IH don't make no 455. Them engines come from Buick. Why? Whussa matter?"
"Well, I checked mine and the plugs are wired 1-5-4-2-6-3-7-8 and there are sparks shooting all over the place and it's rockin' funny."
"Well, no wunner! That's all screwed up! Them plug wires are set for a Ford 352! That thing's gonna run like F' ing $#!+ !"
"Well, no kidding......It DOES run like $#!+ ! Can't get outa it's own way! You guys got a book that tells me what they should be?"
"Book!........Fer Whut? All ya gotta do is set'em up for 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2 That should do it."
So I'm standing there, looking at this scruffy southern dude, who just gave me the firing order for an International Harvester V8 in a school bus, right off the top of his head. Granted, it was a Buick engine and I guess that everyone down South knows everything there is to know about GM/Buick engines, but, Geez.....Ya know?
Just like that? Off the top of his head?
This ain't no NASCAR race car, it's a friggin SCHOOL BUS!
So I write his firing order down and trudge back to the bus, which is now cooled enough to let me change the plug wire order without getting as burned as before. I get back in and start it up. It runs. Perfectly. With no rocking. And no sparks.
The scruffy Southern Dude is a friggin' GENIUS!
So I take a couple of swigs of Mountain Dew and head out, but drive over close to the Service Area and give him a big smile and a toot on the horn (which as I remember, was THE most anaemic horn, ever).
"LIGHT 'EM UP!" I hear him yell as I head towards the highway..........
And "light 'em up" I did. You ever see a school bus cruise at 80?
Loved that story, Gordon. You should save them all and publish them. I'd be first in line for an autographed copy!
Comments and/or witty rejoinders embedded below.
"It was like an Agathe Christie novel.
)
))... and then-- out of the blue-- the crucial bit of information comes out after the mystery is solved. (Again, as soon as the crucial info was discovered I shared it. I am firm in my belief that this was the first time this issue had ever been experienced by anyone in this group of worthy individuals. 
)
It was (and is) pretty entertaining to remember, though." (What would you guys do without me anyway? 
)
Great Story Gorden ! Ahhhh....firing order....Here's one I'll tell on myself ! Back in the Sixties I was working for LA County as a mechanic. My work mostly was on Sheriff patrol cars. After a long run of the GM units I got a Ford Black n White to work on. I finished it and tried to start it up. All it did was backfire, pop and spit ! WTF ! I knew the firing order was correct for a Ford so I statically checked the timing and it was OK too. So now I started to do the "far reach" for answers and came up with nothing. Two other mechanics double checked my work as well and found nothing. Finally the senior mechanic came over and told me what was wrong. He had a reputation for messing with peoples heads in a humored way. He sometimes would make up two long spark plug wires, connect one to the distributor and the other to the spark plug and then hold the other two ends up to his earlobes. You could see the spark jumping. He said he was listening to the timing to make sure it was correct ! I also saw him short out and kill an old Flathead V8 engine in a portable air-raid siren by reaching down and laying his arms across all 8 plug wires ! Anyway, he told me that the problem was that the distributor was running backwards ! I just laughed and thought "Yeah, sure !" But because I was out of ideas and when nobody was watching , I pop the cap, turn the engine over and sure enough, the rotor was turning backwards !! Counterclockwise in a Ford...just the opposite of a GM. After re-wiring the cap in the right rotation it fired up right away. By the way....The easiest way to remember the GM firing order is to write down the number 18....leave a space and double the 18 to 36, leave a space and double the 36 to 72. In the two spaces put in the 4 and the 5.....18436472. The V6 is the easiest....start with 6 and count backwards....654321 !........Bruce
I did reaffirm my thoughts on putting carb windows in...my hands are just barely (severe contorting) able to get in behind the carbs to fine tune. I actually had to attach the lower heim joint to the carb from under the car.
For anyone watching, the mini ratchet sets and a universal swivel is a must!
And if you leave them open when driving, Bill, they'll be another source of fresh, cool air for the engine. For those worried about foreign matter entering the engine compartment, K&N makes a number of flat filters in the 4"x5" and 4"x6" range.
I'm thinking a louvered cover plate with a screen.
Gordon's bus was hitting on 3 cylinders: 1, 6 and 7. My mom had a Ford Torino Wagon that, in the end, was doing about as well.
It was wired right though....
