ok guys heres the setup.
1991 Trans Am with HSR'd 350 with msd box, coil, larger cam, headers and a ed wright chip in the 7730.

Heres the problem
ok well i have had a few problems with this but i think i finally got most of them nailed down except for this one. i am absolutely stumped. so i am trying to time it and when i put the timing light on with the bypass disconnected it runs real rough and it shows -6 degrees retarded so i try to advance it back up to 8 degrees and when i get to 2 degrees advanced it cuts out and dies. try this a couple times, no matter what i do i can't get it to run where its suppose to. replace the plugs becuase they where pretty fouled out and didn't help a whole lot. drove it and i didn't get any SES light but it would cut out around 3000 and backfire a little bit. SO has anyone ever heard of a engine not running advanced
Thanks

 

Yup...

Take a look at the tip of your rotor.

 

Advanced is to the left of TDC on the timing tab, retarded is to the right, as viewed from the front of the motor.

 

yes i know that, i know how to time a motor i have done it plenty of times and it is on the right of the timing tab, retarded. what do you mean take a look at the tip of my rotor? it has a new distributor, cap, rotor, ignition coil, computer it just wont run advanced at all

 

Are you sure that when the cam was installed that the cam timing was done correctly?
Are you looking at the correct line on the balancer?

Stupid questions, I know. BUT it has happened.

 

Not sure what you're asking?

Rotor = the part inside the distributor that turns

Tip = the part that sticks out

Look = directly observe using your eyeballs

Is there anything else in there that's confusing?

 

Evil. Just plain evil.

He replaced his rotor.

 

"Replaced" (some time in the past) is not the same as "look" (now).

I'm just guessing here, because he hasn't really said this; but I'm GUESSING that it started all this malfunction SOMETIME AFTER all that "replacing" business happened. Stop me if I'm wrong, but having nothing else to go on, that's just my GUESS. But, that means, the chronology of events here is, it was OK before; maybe stuff was old or whatever, but it was OK; then it got worked on; NOW it's like THIS but it wasn't before. Meaning also, whatever it LOOKED like when it went in there, it MIGHT JUST NOT look like that any more.

Rule #1 in such a situation is, GO BACK AND CHECK YOUR WORK.. Every piece of it. Which in this case, the simplest thing that will make a motor not run when the timing advances, is the tip of the rotor being broken off and bent sideways from hitting the inside of the cap.

Capisce?

 

EGO agnosco

 

well i looked at the rotor and yes it is still there and intact. though when i got the new distributor the rotor was a little loose. before with the old one it was really tight on the shaft but with the new distributor it fits on it just fits loosely. well i have already run this engine since it being torn apart and it i had the timing set right so i don't think the cam timing is off but maybe. im not getting any trouble codes so i don't really have a lot to go on either. i am still quite stumped on this so any ideas would help.
thanks

 

what kind of balancer are you running? what about the possibility of the outer ring slipping, throwing off your timing marks. do you have the correct timing tab on the front cover?

 

i am still running the stock balancer with the stock timing tab. yea i have thought about that too but if the balancer slipped wouldn't it run normal but the timing light would tell me wrong. it runs like *** and no matter where i turn the distributor it still runs pretty bad. it likes to run according to my balancer around 0 degrees but that is still a bad idle. i don't know i put a new chip on and i was wondering if a bad chip could cause these types of problems i have a new one that i will try today

 

OK; my "good guess" turned out to be just that, a guess. Which is all I could do, like I said so many times, is GUESS, because the information is so incomplete.

So, why don't you come clean, and tell us what's REALLY going on here? Start from the beginning ("first the earth cooled, then the dinosaurs came...") and tell us what's happened to it, what you've done, what parts it's built out of, and when it started doing this. Otherwise, the quality of help you'll get, is going to be pretty low.

 

The chip thing just threw me for a loop. That's a whole 'nother can of worms.

 

no not a new chip that i have never run on it. it is the one from ed wright and i have run it for a year or so with no problems i was just wondering if that could go bad suddenly. im thinking it might be off a distributor tooth on the timing. im gonna try to restab the distributor and see if that helps.

 

U cant be a tooth off in the distributor.

U either have enough room to get the advance u need or u dont.

later
Jeremy

 

Correct. Maybe that little bit of info needs to be a sticky. There is no such thing as being "a tooth off" for exactly what 3.8 said.

 

Your right...don't worry about being one tooth off..thats old theory.
Make sure the wires that connect to your ignition module are the right way around. If it's reverse... the timing would be retarding when it's suppose to be advancing!!

 

ok so i got this fixed. not really sure how either it. so since i had no idea of what was wrong i took the distributor out and took it down to autozone and traded it in for a new one. also i got a new harmonic balancer because i think my other one just slipping. got home and put it on and fired it up and it worked like normal. thanks for all the help