Why details are Impotant...OR...Laugh With Me Not At Me

[Bullitt-]

OK so a few months ago I score a rebuilt 850 TQ from our bud MOPARAL, throw it on the 340, fire it up & while she ran there was a definite misfire that I had not had before. A lot of time had passed since my last carb fiasco so I thought maybe the plugs were fouled or a wire had gotten crossed so I go though the process of removing, cleaning, checking gap but to no avail.. One day when Alan was over we worked on it a little & I decided then that opening up the carb to check the floats etc. would be something to try after making sure all my wires were in order etc...... Fast forward to this weekend & I finally yank the top off the T/Q & just as I suspected there were some float issues, one of the tangs that push against the needles was bent so I adjusted it to match the other, reassembled & fired her up..... Although she sounded a bit stronger there was still a high rpm backfire & generally ran rougher than usual....Well it must be a bad wire or plug so I go about methodically removing each wire & plug, ohming each out....started with #1, then 3,5,7 no problems observed...over to the passenger side # 2 then # 4 OK.....uhhhh wheres the wire for # 6?.  ....& 8?!?!?!? Dangling off the back side of the engine where I had stopped a month ago        

                           All's well that ends well .

[67vertman]

Ouch......been there done that...

But mine was the rotor......

[422STROKER]

Yup, last time I pulled my distributor out I couldn't get the engine restarted afterwards, I forgot to plug the distributor back in.

Tom

[MEK-Dangerfield]

When I replaced my plug wires, I had a mis-fire, but only at idle. 


The problem was one plug wire wasn't totally inserted into the distributor cap.   


  Mike   

[Oldschool]

Kinda reminds me of a time when I was 16 or so and I decided my 57 Chevy with a 283 needed a set of points, new rotor, cap, plugs and wires.  Wouldn't crank for the next 2 weeks...            I finally discovered that I had done something you aren't supposed to be able to do.  I had somehow installed the rotor 180* off.  If you guys remember, there was a round tang and a square tang on the rotor to keep that from happening.  But, leave it to me, I managed to put a round peg in a square hole and visa-versa...       

[Bullitt-]

When I replaced my plug wires, I had a mis-fire, but only at idle. 


The problem was one plug wire wasn't totally inserted into the distributor cap.  


  Mike   

Yea while I was testing my relatively new MSD wires I found that a couple of them wanted to jump back out after insertion, so I spread them a little to get better gription.

[cudadave72]

Stuff like that happens to me more than I'd like to admit!!!!

[Moparal]

     Now lets go for a ride

[Bullitt-]

    Now lets go for a ride

Just need the back yard to dry out a little, don't want to get mired down, but I think she would make it a couple of laps.......Don't forget to bring a couple of jugs of gas... 

[71chally416]

My brother, who I love to death but has no mechanical ability whatsoever, actually put his distributor cap on backwards and broke it to make it fit over the square alignment tab. His reasoning was only the hold-down clips had to line up.

[The Cuda Guy]

    Now lets go for a ride

Great minds think alike, I was just going to say how does she run now???

Don

[MyMopar]

If we are sharing your oversight is similar to mine, in a non-similar way.  My wife's convertible top wouldn't power up/down anymore.  So I ripped out the interior to get to the motors, they checked out fine, pulled the dash apart to get the switch, it was fine.  I had already checked the fuses which were fine.  So I'm 2 hours into this project when I noticed teh power window switch looked funny, it was stuck in the down position.  Moved it back to neutral and on a crazy whim hit the power top button and bingo, top works.    Reassemble the car and all set
Oh I did manage to break a $141 latch, I still haven't fessed up to that though, hopefully the replacement comes in real soon.

[sleepychallenger]

i was once without power for about two days. put in a new starter relay, however, forgot to hook the positive battery cable up to it. hooked it to the battery, but not the relay. long story short, i checked every fuse, wire, starter and key switch. i saw that the cable was hooked to the battery but didnt figure that i would forget the other part. 

[Bullitt-]

If we are sharing your oversight is similar to mine, in a non-similar way.  My wife's convertible top wouldn't power up/down anymore.  So I ripped out the interior to get to the motors, they checked out fine, pulled the dash apart to get the switch, it was fine.  I had already checked the fuses which were fine.  So I'm 2 hours into this project when I noticed teh power window switch looked funny, it was stuck in the down position.  Moved it back to neutral and on a crazy whim hit the power top button and bingo, top works.    Reassemble the car and all set
Oh I did manage to break a $141 latch, I still haven't fessed up to that though, hopefully the replacement comes in real soon.

Cost to correct convertible problem...........  Zero $
Cost of experience gained .......................  $141
Value of wifie knowing YOUR DA MAN.........PRICELESS

[bb71challenger]

Hey, you are not alone. I changed cams and heads on my 400 before my car went to paint and when it was all buttoned up I could not get her to fire up for anything. 180 out, nothing I did helped. That is when I noticed that a 340 distributor and a 383 distributor look and install IDENTICALLY...........but they turn opposite of each other 

When I pulled the distributor I laid the cap with wires in one spot and put the distributor on a shelf......right next to my 340 distributor lol. Guess which one I picked up and installed first 

Yeah, the guys over at Moparnuts got a really good laugh out of that one.