Morris Minor Owners Club

Hi,

Can anyone help? I made a slip up and didnt tighten my distributor. net effect was it spun round and bent the wieght mechanism and ruined the distributor. I fitted a new distributor but can't get the engine to time up correctly. could the distributor spinning and locking have caused the drive to jump round round a dog in the engine? If I time up on the tdc mark the engine runs very badly and is puking out fumes via the rocker box. I I time dynamically on a timing light it still sounds wrong although it does start easily.

Any ideas? thank you chris

PS - Compressions on piston are all about 155 Psi

You have got a couple of plug leads crossed over by the sound of it! If not, the condenser is dead, has that effect, or points barely opening. Put the original known set of points and condenser in, don't worry about any strobes etc, get it running with the clamp (gulp) loose enough to just turn the distributor by hand, and twist clockwise. The engine will come on song and revs increase as you get to the right area. If it stalls instead then it is too advanced (unlikely if you timed it to TDC!). You won't have damaged any internals of the engine, even if the cog did skip it wouldn't have any bearing on the running. Other possibilities are the rotor arm and cap if you have changed them.
When she is running, road test, with increasing advance until she is just starting to pink under load, then back timing off a tad.

PS: She will sound like a bag of **** if you have timed her to run at TDC! Needs nearer 5-7 dgrees BTDC static!

Hi, Thanks for the re assurrance I will give it a try. I played around and lost the plot!!

Chris