rebuilt 40hp won't start

Have just completed rebuilding my 40hp bug and put the motor back in the car hooked it up and it won't start. lined board, reground cam, new crankshaft bearings and such, new standard pistons, new battery.

While putting it together I put the dot between the two dots...cam to crank.

I believe that I have timed it properly.

As I began to start the motor I took the coil wire off and primed it by turning it over in bursts of 30 sec or so. Then, I put the coil wire back on and was sure it would take right off.....it would turn over but never fire.

I drained all gas out of the gas tank prior to attempting to start and put in fresh gas and fresh oil. I turned it over enough to have gas come out of the fuel pump...I then connected the pump to the carb. I've taken the air cleaner off the carb and looked down in the carb and I can see gas being squirted down the carb....I've even poured a little raw gas down the throat of the carb.....trying to start it.....no fire....I then took a spark plug wire off and with another spark plug held it to ground and got good spark. Now as I write this I am thinking.....I've never taken one of the spark plugs out to see how they are although they were fairly new prior to the rebuild.

I've back tracked checking all electrical connections....I've taken the distributer cap off and lined the rotor up with the line on the distributor and then lined up the mark on the pully with the motor crack and static timed it...the light came on with all those things where they were suppose to be.

It has been very cold here (Wash State) and I'll usually put a couple hours into trying to get it to go and then I'll run back into the house to warm up....would the temp have anything to do with it not starting????

I keep thinking I've never taken the plugs out to look at them.....I should do that....any other ideas????? Thanks in advance.

Mike

Reply to
Mike
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Begin at the beginning.

Take the plugs out and see if they're wet with gas. Dry them or replace.

Check the dist for correct installation, you may be 180 degrees out and this can cause you to flood the engine because the spark is occurring so far out of time.

Don't forget to verify that you have the ignition wires on in the correct order.

-ANT

Stop that. To reply change my ISP to @hotmail.com

distributor

Reply to
ANT

You can read the article: "Why won't my engine start?" on my web site, but you've covered most of the steps.

One thing you haven't done is verify that #1 cyl is getting spark on the *compression* stroke. There are actually *two* places where the pulley says TDC, but only one of them is correct.

When the rotor is looking at #1 plug wire, pull the valve cover off and see if *both* valves are closed for #1.

Speedy Jim

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Reply to
Speedy Jim

When starting with an empty carb, take off the air cleaner, and pour gas into the small vent hole above the crab bowl. That will fill the carb. Put the air cleaner back on. If you have a backfire and have a gasoline fire inside the air cleaner that's one thing, just turn the ignition, and suck the fire back down into the intake. To start a fire on top of an open wet-with-gas carb on your new engine is another.

Have someone crank the engine while you use a timing light to check the spark timing. Did you put the distrubitor drive gear in backwards? The PO did that to clayton, took me forever to find out why he did not start after replacing the spark plug wires. If this is the case, just move the wires across the dist, 1-3 and 2-4. Ask someone else to give you advice on changing the distrubitor gear, I had my friend "Tanker Fred" help me with mine. Pretty much pull the fuel pump; spacer block; shaft. Get your widest flat blade screwdriver (we used a flat file). Put a big blob of grease into the distrubitor drive (as glue). Then proceded to twist the gear, and pull up with the file to get it to raise. Then rotated it a half turn (from where it left the gear mesh). Re-assembled, and were good to go.

Reply to
Michael Kelly

what michael said about the dist. drive gear happened to me. i rebuilt my

1500 sp engine and was all set to start it. did the priming you spoke of with wire off the coil and everything else you should. when i switched the spark plug wires on the dist. cap it started right up. i then had to rotate the dist. drive gear which i found to be a pain in the ass but it's all back togather now and running like a top.

Reply to
paul horvath

Reply to
Ilambert

mine is 180 deg wrong too... is it that important to rotate it ?

Reply to
Eduardo Kaftanski

It can be important. The engine case has an opening to allow oil to get splashed onto the distributor drive shaft bearing. If the distributor is turned too far, the splash opening won't line up and it won't get any oil. Pull your distributor out and see if it looks like a problem before you jump into pulling the drive gear.

Speedy Jim

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Reply to
Speedy Jim

No problem there... When I installed my dist I specifically installed it with that opening lined up...

I am mostly worried about the retarding of number 3, but my dist does not look like it does that. Maybe its just so small a different I can't tell it just by looking....

Reply to
Eduardo Kaftanski

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