Trouble setting ignition timing

bb1boy · Post by **bb1boy** » Mon Aug 18, 2014 10:37 am

I turned it around and tweaked the colours a little to make the "15" a bit easier to see.. hopefully

Post by **Vtecmec** » Mon Aug 18, 2014 11:10 am

It's more visible in the metal, as opposed to a photograph.

Post by **GreenyUK** » Mon Aug 18, 2014 9:12 pm

Hahha apparently I'm competitive

It would nice to have it running right. Although it's not going to help this engine is on it's last! Legs. It's smoking out of vtec and at low speeds now. Full rebuild real soon

bb1boy · Post by **bb1boy** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 9:20 am

GreenyUK wrote:It's smoking out of vtec and at low speeds now. Full rebuild real soon

Ah bugger..

11891952 · Post by **11891952** » Tue Aug 19, 2014 1:03 pm

Bludge, the other option (if anybody near you has one you could borrow) is a Reglus angle gauge, then you could avoid rotating the engine backwards. "Just" find TDC, set the gauge to zero and then rotate by hand to 345°, that's your 15°BTDC.

Post by **GreenyUK** » Sun Aug 24, 2014 4:21 pm

@merlin I'm really confused. At the moment I have just hand cranked the engine to find this 15 and a red mark which I did

great. Painted it with tipex to be able to see it with the light.

I shone the light with strobe set to zero and I could see this mark? So put the strobe on 15 and tried to adjust the dizzy to get the white mark back in position. Now I've turned the sissy as far as it will go! Towards the firewall and the mark is still not in site. So I stepped the strobe setting down one at time. When the mark became visible the strobe gun was on 12.

Now I don't get what's going? Why is it so far out and I'm not able to bring it with spec?
Is my actual timing wrong?

I thought it wouldn't run right at all? Or break if the actual timing was out?

Post by **GreenyUK** » Sun Aug 24, 2014 4:49 pm

Right well after returning to the car from writing the above. Holly asked what happens if the dizzy is turned the other way(retarding) so I showed her. Upon returning it back to where it was (advanced) it was stuck a little so I put more pressure on it, which shot it all the way. To which holly said oow I can see the mark. And there it was on the 15 In between the markers ? No idea how that happened, so I just tightened the bolts back up and left it.

'92 Si VTEC · Post by **jjmartin349571** » Sun Aug 24, 2014 5:24 pm

I think the problem is that you have the strobe set to +15. I believe that you would only use this if you were timing up a car which only had a 0 degree mark and nothing else - setting the timing so that the TDC mark was showing with the gun set .to +15 would mean that you had the timing advanced 15 degrees. The +15 degree mark on your flywheel is there so that you can time the car using a strobe with no advance (or a gun like yours set to 0). So to me it sounds like your timing was already ok. Somebody more informed than myself may be able to confirm this, as I may well be wrong

Post by **GreenyUK** » Sun Aug 24, 2014 6:24 pm

Ok, that kinda makes sense to me. But surely with this gun. (Snap-on) the idea of setting it is to allow you set the timingob the car. So if I wanted 17 which is advanced by 2 over standard I'd set the gun to 17 which would make the mark seem like it's moved due to the strobe.
Then I advance the dizzy until the mark lines back up. Then that's it timing now on 17.

Is that not the theory behind it? Lol

I've left it where it is for now, the idle is higher though now.

'92 Si VTEC · Post by **jjmartin349571** » Sun Aug 24, 2014 6:58 pm

Yeah, but if your gun can be set to give you advance, you should be timing it by the tdc mark and not the +15 degree mark is what I'm trying to say - the +15 degree mark is there so that you can set the timing with a gun that has no advance/is always set to 0 degrees.

So in your case, if you want 17 degrees then set your gun to +17 and use the strobe to adjust the dizzy so that the tdc mark is in line with the pointer. Then when you set the gun to 0 degrees, you should be able to use the strobe and see the 15 degree mark is a couple of degrees off the pointer.

By the sounds of it, you set your gun to +17 degrees and set the timing using the +15 degree mark... Won't this mean your timing is actually set to +32 degrees

I've only timed up my Golf which has no advance markers, you set the base timing with the vacuum advance off, but I'm hoping somebody on here can clarify if what I'm saying is right