Distributor related woes

[Flash]

Hi Fellow Mokers,

I'm new to the Moke scene having recently purchased a 1974 1100cc Moke and am in need of some guidance and support.

The Moke has undergone a body restoration somewhere along the line and whilst it presents very well it has suffered with what I can only describe as an engine "stumble" from the day we bought it. I started off by fitting new plugs, points and condenser, but the problem persisted. Over the last few weeks the stumble has got progressively worse to the point where the engine would cut out completely and I would battle to re-start it.

I popped a timing light on and noticed that at idle the timing mark was jumping around. I then pulled the distributor out and discovered a huge amount of play in the distributor shaft. After chatting to the team at Minisport I decided to invest in a new 45D electronic distributor rather than having my tired old 29D refurbished. The new distributor arrived yesterday afternoon and I set about installing it this morning. It's at this point that things started to get interesting.

When I went to clean up the timing marks on the flywheel I discovered that the dull painted marks placed by a previous owner are not actually on the correct flywheel factory markings, but are about 40 degrees before the factory markings. I decided to ignore these home made marks and proceeded to setup the engine at the correct position for cylinder 1 using the procedure outlined in my Moke repair manual (cylinder 1 at TDC on compression stroke with factory TDC flywheel timing mark aligned with the pointer).

I then proceeded to install the new distributor and it's at this point that things became really interesting. My repair manual states that with cylinder 1 set to TDC the key at the bottom of the distributor should align with the slot in the distributor drive shaft and the rotor should point at roughly the 1 o'clock position. In my case with the distributor shaft key snuggly fitted into the slot the rotor points slightly past the 3 o'clock position.

This, together with the presence of the home made timing marks on the flywheel has got me wondering whether at some point in the past the gear at the end of the distributor driveshaft has been set a tooth out.  Has anyone come across this before ?

Thanks for reading

[Terry]

Hi,

welcome to the world of Mokes.

The mark at 40 degrees is possibly a maximum advance marking which tends to be high as 30 degrees max. advance is the general wisdom, so assuming you haven't taken the 'wok'(clutch cover) off to measure things I would guess your 40 and my 30 are the same mark.

If you follow the instructions in this post I have explained how to check the timing and making sure you are on the right cycle and then how to move the distributor drive to get things in the right position. https://www.mokeforum.com.au/index.php?topic=13435.msg162468#msg162468

Terry

[Flash]

Thanks very much for the welcome Terry and thanks also for the link to your previous post. I really appreciate the guidance. I'll let you know how I get on.

[Steam]

Welcome
I would suggest that you ignore what has gone on with your engine before, as POB,s will almost certainly derail you.
Starting from scratch with no pre conceived ideas will certainly produce the best results.
The a series engine is as dependant on fuel settings as ignition and one cannot be changed without affecting the other.
Have a look here for issues I went through earlier this year.

https://www.mokeforum.com.au/index.php?topic=13962.0

In particular make sure you have the correct coil for your new distributor and it is wired corectly.
Also find out exactly what the max advance for your engine is, an adjustable timing light allows accurate setting of max advance at the specified revs.
 This is all after you are sure the dizzy and drive are correctly set as per Terry states.
Then re heck the fuel once the timing is set.
Cheers Dave.

[Terry]

Hi,

I was fitting a dizzy into an engine today so I tried out the symptoms you described and I can confirm you are one tooth out. If you remove the drive using the bolt as described and then feed it back in holding the drive so the slot points to 3:30pm then as it slots in it will rotate back to 1pm.

Terry

[Flash]

Thanks so much for confirming Terry.

I didn't get as much time as I'd hoped on the Moke today, but I did manage to do a quick fix by moving the HT leads one position around in a clockwise direction and then rotated the dizzy until the rotor was pointing at the HT for cylinder 1 and I managed to get it started. It seemed to run okay, but it felt like the timing was still out. Tried to tweak it but she backfired and died and try as I might I couldn't find the sweet spot to get it to run again. I ran out of time so I had to give up.

Do the results of my quick fix make sense and still support the theory that I am one tooth out ?

Looks like I'll get more time on the Moke tomorrow. 

[Flash]

Welcome
I would suggest that you ignore what has gone on with your engine before, as POB,s will almost certainly derail you.
Starting from scratch with no pre conceived ideas will certainly produce the best results.
The a series engine is as dependant on fuel settings as ignition and one cannot be changed without affecting the other.
Have a look here for issues I went through earlier this year.

https://www.mokeforum.com.au/index.php?topic=13962.0

In particular make sure you have the correct coil for your new distributor and it is wired corectly.
Also find out exactly what the max advance for your engine is, an adjustable timing light allows accurate setting of max advance at the specified revs.
 This is all after you are sure the dizzy and drive are correctly set as per Terry states.
Then re heck the fuel once the timing is set.
Cheers Dave.

Thanks for the welcome Dave and also for the valuable advice. As you will see from my reply to Terry's afternoon post I managed to take half a step forward today and I can confirm that you are "bang on the money" in terms of the link between changes to timing and its effect on fuelling. Just a short 10 minute ride today and when I got back I pulled the plugs and noted that she was running lean which is a first as it has always run rich with the flogged out distributor. I'll be sure to put my Gunson colour tuner through its paces when I get the timing properly sorted.

[Terry]

Thanks so much for confirming Terry.

I didn't get as much time as I'd hoped on the Moke today, but I did manage to do a quick fix by moving the HT leads one position around in a clockwise direction and then rotated the dizzy until the rotor was pointing at the HT for cylinder 1 and I managed to get it started. It seemed to run okay, but it felt like the timing was still out. Tried to tweak it but she backfired and died and try as I might I couldn't find the sweet spot to get it to run again. I ran out of time so I had to give up.

Do the results of my quick fix make sense and still support the theory that I am one tooth out ?

Looks like I'll get more time on the Moke tomorrow.

Yes, you are just moving the body and cap 60 degrees to match up with the new position so you can get it to firing. 3pm is still okay as it fits with the rule of thumb that the lead closest to the radiator is number #1, but sometimes dizzy's particularly those with vacuum diaphragm housings that hits on the oil pressure switch or oil pipe it doesn't always workout so people move the body without relocating the drive.

To get it to run nicely you need to use a timing light to set it up by the marks at idle between 6-10 degrees, don't try and do it by ear, and once you have the timing right you can move onto the fuel mixture.

Terry

[Flash]

Brilliant Terry, I really appreciate all of the time that you have invested in helping me out. I'm looking forward to re-aligning the distributor driveshaft tomorrow.

I'll update you on how things go.

Cheers for now, Gordon

[Steam]

G'day Gordon
 Did you confirm you have the correct coil for your new distributor?
Cheers Dave.

[Flash]

Morning Dave,

Thanks for the tip regarding the coil. Yes, luckily it is the right one, so one less thing for me to worry about. I read through your post on the issues that you experienced. Sounds like the PO had played around with a good few things on your Moke. Good on you for working everything out. Hopefully mine hasn't been interfered with too much.

I'm looking forward to sharing the outcome of my planned activities later today.

[Flash]

Well it's been another interesting morning on the Moke front.

With the engine set to TDC (confirmed by TDC mark on the flywheel and by checking that cylinder 1 was on the compression stroke at TDC) I started off by pulling out the new 45D to get to the distributor shaft. The single bolt that holds the driveshaft housing came out easily enough but the housing was seized solidly in place. Sprayed a bit of WD40 around the place, grabbed a long punch and a hammer and then slowly tapped the housing on the mounting bolt lugs to get the housing to rotate. Alternated my tapping to get both a clockwise and anti-clockwise movement. Once I had the housing loose enough to rotate by hand I then used a bit of muscle power to pry it loose (boy I sure wish my Moke had a removable front grill - it's so much harder doing things with only a narrow gap to work in. I guess it's something I will get used to).

Anyway, with the housing removed I poked my light at the hole and noted that the slot in the shaft was sitting somewhere close to the 4 o'clock position, so definitely not where it should be. I slotted a longish spare 5/16 bolt in to the distributor drive shaft, tied a piece of twine onto the bolt head for insurance purposes and it was easy enough to then pull the shaft out.

Next I double checked the orientation of the slot in the shaft and put a paint marker on it so that I made sure I was putting it in the right way around. I then followed the instructions provided by Terry and reinserted the shaft at around the 3:30 position. Sure enough as the shaft pushed home it rotated anti clockwise and ended up pointing at the 1 o'clock position.

Now it's at this point that I need some additional guidance. My repair manual shows an image of the correct orientation of the shaft slot. According to the image with the slot in the 1 o'clock position the top of the slot should form a straight line between the centre of the two distributor mounting holes. In my case the slot runs from the centre of the housing retaining bolt to the upper edge of the opposite distributor mounting bolt. Try as I might I can't get things to line up like the image in my manual. Is the manual perhaps misleading or am I still doing something wrong ?

Apologies if this sounds a bit confusing. I was hoping to upload an image showing what I mean, but being a newbie I can't seem to find the attachments option.

[Terry]

Flash,

regarding photos, we have a Gallery and don't use attachments so to learn how to do it start with the post at the top of this board and see how you go, https://www.mokeforum.com.au/index.php?board=77.0

Terry

[Flash]

Thanks heaps for pointing me in the right direction in terms of the gallery Terry.

I've just uploaded the modified image of the diagram from my repair manual showing the orientation of the slot in the distributor driveshaft. The blue line is the position stipulated in the manual and the red line depicts the current orientation of my driveshaft slot after I re-positioned the driveshaft.



The repair manual states "there is a degree of conflicting information from the manufacturer as to the correct position of this slot on later engines. As a general rule, when refitting the driveshaft, set the slot in the same position it was in prior to removal"

Thought I would seek the opinions of the learned as to whether my orientation is correct before I assemble everything else.

[Terry]

Hi,

what manual are you looking in?

I looked at an engine, two Gregory's and a Haynes manual and they all show the bottom end of the slot point at or just before or after the single hole that holds the housing in place.

A bit out of focus but this image is of an engine that shows what I think is normal.


...having now seen previous post.
Looking at your pictures, I am not sure what A is supposed to be showing other than direction of travel of the shaft while B and the comments from your manual match what I see in various manuals with some saying it should be pointed at '20 to two'.

I think you are close enough to bolt it up.

Terry