New here, need some help ie.. disrtibutor

[red99frc]

Just joined the club and have a question. I have a '71 240Z that I just put a Pertronics system in. Runs real nice but I have to run extreme advance which requires the adjustment of the distributor beyond the slot adjustment. ?? Timing light shows about 17 degrees advance. Also the plug wires on the dist. has #1 wire at the firewall side and not at the front which seems to be 180 degrees off of where I've read that it should be.?? We checked for TDC on #1 and it seems corrrect. Any ideas of what's going on here? My son just got this car from my brother-in-law and we're trying to get it in a good reliable condition for him to drive. Any help or in sight on this is greatly appreciated!

[Shade133]

firing order should be 153624 going counter clockwise. #1 on my 280z with engine at top dead center and mark on timing marker at 0 degrees its pointing directly at the hood not the firwall and that is #1 then it goes 153624 counter clockwise from there.

if you pull the dizzy out and note the rod had a short side and a long side. short side should be towards the front of the car and at 5 degrees counter clockwise if your looking at it from the driver side facing the passenger side.

get a manual for the car it explaines all this with pictures

[motorman7]

If the shaft driving the dizzy is 180 degrees out, then the dizzy can be 180 out and run just fine. The motor doesn't care, it just wants the spark at the right time. Also, if you are running with out the smog pump, then the advance is pretty large, close to what you are saying I believe. You can re-orient that shaft 180 but you have to remove the oil pump and that gets messy

[red99frc]

Thats what I thought. Brother-in-law rebuilt the engine/heads several years back, so I guess it's time for a little ribbin'! Without the smog equip. it should be right around 17 degrees. Checked out the manuals (factory & Chilton) as well as the dist. shaft, but couldn't find any way to change it 180 degrees without getting to the pump. Thanks for the input gentlemen, I appreciate it.

[Shade133]

ya you will have to take the pump off. i just checked mine sunday took me all about 15 minutes. and its not that messy. i think maybe baby cups worth of oil came out allthough it has been sitting for a while.

[Walter Moore]

The presence or absence of the air reactor pump has no effect on the correct ignition timing. The static timing is determined by the type of distributor that you have installed. The last post in this thread:

http://www.classiczcars.com/forums/showthread.php?t=34192&highlight=distributor+chart

Contains a spreadsheet that lists the correct static timing, spark advance, etc for all distributors used on first two generations of Z cars. (Per the FSM from each year)

The thread lists ZX (S130) models, but the chart includes all U.S. models from 70-83.

For a 71, with the stock (U.S. specification) points style distributor and a working vacuum advance the correct static timing is 5 degrees BTDC. Anything larger and you risk significant spark knock once the engine speed reaches about 3k rpm.

The 17 degree static timing is for a European specification distributor. They have less centrifugal advance but it kicks in at a lower speed. (The U.S. specification unit was an early attempt at emissions control.)

Oh, and if you pull the oil pump off to set the timing correctly, be sure that you double and triple check the new position before you re-mount the pump. I have had to remove the pump multiple times because I moved the drive the wrong direction before.:stupid:

(But I am sure no one else has ever had that happen...)

[Shade133]

walter, i got it right the first time, but i had a budy put it in while i watched where the shaft ended up.

[JohnnyO]

snip.... Checked out the manuals (factory & Chilton) as well as the dist. shaft, but couldn't find any way to change it 180 degrees without getting to the pump. Thanks for the input gentlemen, I appreciate it.

If you need to rotate it exactly 180 degrees you can do this by dismantling the top end of the dizzy and rotating the guts 180 degrees. Takes about 10 minutes and does not require removing the oil pump. Chilton shows the parts blowup. Study that and you will see how it can be done.

I did this last month and it works great.

John

EDIT: Not sure if this can be done with a Pertronix.

Edited August 25, 2010 by JohnnyO

[Snakeyes711]

Does anyone have pictures of what its supposed to look like? I set this car on TDC, and the Dizzy rotor is pointing toward the fire wall. Plus which point to start the wires from? My FSM really doesn't show where to start.

When I started looking at the ignition, the #1 cyl was in the #6 cyl. According to how this car is timed the rear most cyl is #1 as the rotor at TDC points to it. make sense?

I'm going to take pictures.

[Snakeyes711]

Here are some pics of how its set, is this correct?

Edited September 5, 2010 by Snakeyes711

[Mikez73]

As stated previously...on the dizzy the terminal nearest the radiator is #1. Going clockwise from there its #5-#3-#6-#2-#4

The cylinders in the motor are just as you'd expect: 1-2-3-4-5-6

If you need to reorient the dizzy as in a post stated above, you nedd to disassemble the dizzy and rotate the part circled in red in this diagram:

[Snakeyes711]

BTW, the Thermo time switch has been bypassed, wires looped back together. Is this why the car stumbles, and bogs as soon as you get on the gas?

Wait? going clockwise? The wires are placed counter clockwise.

The cylinders in the motor are just as you'd expect: 1-2-3-4-5-6

:

Looking at the engine from the Drivers side?

Thanks for your help BTW.

Edited September 5, 2010 by Snakeyes711