I had to replace the intake manifold gasket on my 1988 chevy truck with a 350 TBI due to a coolant leak. I've got it all back together and it won't start. It does fire some just not enough to start.
I'm thinking the problem is when I reinstalled the distributor. I marked the postion of the rotor and the distributor to the manifold before I removed it. I ran into one small problem when re-installing the distributor, the rotor did not end up in exactly the same location. It might be 10 degrees off or one tooth on the gear. The distributor would not fully seat unless I choose the gear positon that appears to be off by one. I did not turn over the engine before reinstalling the distributor.
I read on the newsgroup that the distributor can only be installed right or 180 degrees out. That appeared to be the case here. I'm sure I don't have it 180 degrees out - just one gear tooth off maybe.
I do have the distributor housing installed exactly as it was before so the timing is'nt off due to the clamp position.
I obviously don't know exactly what I'm doing. I'm just trying to learn something here. I've got the hard part done - I just need it to start again!
What would cause the one tooth off problem on the rotor alignment? The distributor seemed to seat only one way.
Any help would be appreciated.
Brian