need 6 pack help

[Highbanked Hauler]

For your piston stop, you have to spin the crank until it hits, mark it, then spin it the other way until it hits and mark that. TDC is halfway between the 2 marks (assuming you're on the compression stroke).

I once used a screwdriver in the way maxwellwedge mentioned... bad idea!

Troy

     OK, all I did was to roll the motor over till the dist. rotor was coming up on No.1, put the TDC bolt in and with a ratchet brought the piston up till it hit the bolt. I figured it had to be on the comp. stroke or it would be 180 off. I hate engines !!!! I would rather tint color any day.

[Troy]

For your piston stop, you have to spin the crank until it hits, mark it, then spin it the other way until it hits and mark that. TDC is halfway between the 2 marks (assuming you're on the compression stroke).

I once used a screwdriver in the way maxwellwedge mentioned... bad idea!

Troy

     OK, all I did was to roll the motor over till the dist. rotor was coming up on No.1, put the TDC bolt in and with a ratchet brought the piston up till it hit the bolt. I figured it had to be on the comp. stroke or it would be 180 off. I hate engines !!!! I would rather tint color any day.

So cheating a bit... the piston will come to the top of the cylinder on every crank revolution. Since the balancer is connected to the crank, the same spot (hopefully on the timing mark) will end up in the same place every time the piston is at it's highest point. So, to mark this on the balancer you don't care if you're on the compression stroke or not. What the "piston stop" does is blocks the piston in it's motion at a precise spot before it can reach the top. When you spin the crank backwards until it hits again that will be the opposite point in the crank's arc. The small area between the two points (not the long way around) is the part the piston stop was blocking and the center point of that area is where the piston would have been at its highest point (Top Dead Center).

You need to know compression stroke to determine when to fire the plug as this only does anything fun when the valves are closed. The cam spins at half the speed of the crank so you get to TDC twice on the crank for each time the valves are fully closed by the cam. This is how you could be "180 degrees out" (but it doesn't sound like it in your case). So, at TDC of the compression stroke the distributor rotor should be pointed to where the #1 plug wire is attached. Your ignition advance is in relation to this spot. That's when you need to check for air escaping the park plug hole (when the exhaust valve is open the air just goes out that way). The next time the piston comes to the top the rotor will be pointing in the opposite direction. A handy point about that: you can also set the timing using #6 if your #1 plug wire is hard to get the probe on.

You probably can't get the engine to run at exactly TDC. Disconnect the distributor vacuum advance before setting the timing so you're only dealing with the mechanical advance.

Since this was running before I probably shouldn't have to point out this next part but I will "just in case": distributor advance is typically run from the vacuum port on the carb NOT the intake. My after market carbs don't have a vacuum port so I have a specially configured distributor that works with manifold vacuum. Or you can just plug it off - but I like the slightly better efficiency when cruising on the highway.

Troy

[BSB67]

For your piston stop, you have to spin the crank until it hits, mark it, then spin it the other way until it hits and mark that. TDC is halfway between the 2 marks (assuming you're on the compression stroke).

Did you do what is described above?  Where it stops is not TDC