dizzy/timing q's

Well, you're on the right track. Air, fuel, spark, and compression are the magic ingredients for a running engine.

- Did you check your firing order and that your plugs are wired correctly?

- Does the coil have power?

- You can check a plug by putting a spare plug in the boot and grounding it on the engine or chassis and have someone crank it and you should see spark.

BTW, what mods were you doing that required you to pull the distributer out? Could other mods be your real gremlin?

and even if the car is out of time, you should have spark. If you have clearance to spin the dizzy while getting it in time, just spin it till it is in time (no such thing as being one tooth off - that is an internet myth).

The exhaust stroke will also push a little bit of air out the plug hole and the car will run on the exhaust stroke (just barely or sometimes not at all). So making sure you are on the compression stroke is useful.

Good luck.

Check for spark at the cap by unplugging the coil wire at the cap. Then just lay the wire near some metal and crank the car to see if you have spark. Of course you need a friend to do the cranking. You can do the same to see if you getting spark at any of the plugs as well.

With the cap on, I marked the bowl of the distributor where #1 point was. The rotor will spin clockwise as you set it in, so you need to turn it to where it's about 1/8 of the way BEHIND (counter-clockwise) of the #1 spot. Then make sure you are on TDC of the compression stroke. If your valve covers are off, you can watch to see when both valves are closed, then just leave it there until you're ready to set the timing, or you can just stick your finger in the spark plug hole and feel for the piston. Then there's no reason related to timing (assuming you have adequate spark as others mentioned) that the car won't start. You mentioned you have fuel, so it should work. Just keep trying, it took me about a dozen times restabbing the dizzy to get it to fire after my h/c/i swap.