first 280

[nutxo]

I had a chance at a 76 280z a few days ago and jumped on it. The guy I bought it from says the last mechanic said it had an air problem, somewhere in the conversation it came up the mechanic said the engine was worn, sounded like timing to me...

Anyways, I drive this thing home praying its gonna make it, popping backfiring , yadda yadda.

As soon as I get off work yesterday I run home to play with it. First thing I find is brand new plug wires, angle boots on cap but the connectors were straight and 3 werent even close to being in the cap and 2 werent all the way connected at the spark plug end, I was happy as a pig in, well , you know. I thought I was gonna get off easy...

I get this thing goin and 3 minutes later its half dead again, I set the timing and by the time i go around the block its out of time, if it stays in time I have to nurse it into the powerband. It gets goin good then bam,.runs like crud again. Am I overlooking somethign?

btw, its efi.

any ideas would be appreciated.

:disappoin

[2ManyZs]

If the timing is changing, it's got to be in the timing chain or in the distributor or distributor drive.

First thing I would do is pull the valve cover and check to see if the timing chain is loose, if it is, you'll need to pull the front cover and replace the chain and tensioner.

If that is OK, pull the distributor cap and check to see if the shaft of the distributor is OK, also look for any loose pieces of plastic or ball bearings from the advance plate....

Those are only a couple things that could be causing the timing problem, if that is really what is wrong in the first place...

[nutxo]

found a roll pin about a 1/4 inch long ,.. was thinkin it might be off a counter weight, isnt off anyhting up top i can see

[2ManyZs]

If you found a roll pin loose in the distributor, it had to come from something fairly important....wonder if it's could be off the star wheel(reluctor)on the shaft itself? If you look down on the top of the reluctor there should be one roll pin in it to hold it on the distributor shaft, it's the only roll pin I can think of in the 280 distributor.....

[nutxo]

luckily while i was putting the distributor back together i broke t so i no longer need to repair it, just replace it (when did they start using plastic parts? ):disappoin