Hi guys Ive recently got my hands on 65 with a 327 350hp and am currently trying to slowly rebuild it. The engine was running fine then I got a rough shaking and it seemed misfiring but still running. A friend was turning the distributor later and it shut off. Now it wont crank but turns over fine. Could the turning of the distributor cause the engine to jump time? Therefore it wont start.

Any suggestions would be fine Im really green learning as I go Thanks.

Yes, turning the distributor could have effected the timing to the point where it won't start. What direction was he turning teh distributor (CW or CCW)? If he advanced or retarded the timing to far, it would cause teh motor to stall out. Try and start teh car while having him (or someone else) turn the distributor the other way, and it should fire eventually. Just don't turn it to drastically one way or the other.

As for teh running rough, are you sure the firing order is right? (1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2?) Was it running OK before you played with the timing?

Chris

It began running rough before the the distributor was turned I believe, also he turned it cw/ccw to see if one would make difference No matter where we turn it wont start could the timing be that far off? thanks

Hey again shouldnt it fire at the plugs even if the timing is off tried to test firing at plug with test light but no light when I turned over motor.

G you won't be able to use your test light. Pull one of the plugs from the engine hook the sparkplug wire to it and then hold the plug against a good ground and have your buddy crank the engine over and see if you have spark. I think like Chris does on this you probably just moved the distributor to far.
Mike

The engine was running fine then I got a rough shaking and it seemed misfiring but still running.


The timing was most likely not the cause of it starting to run rough and now you have two problems.

I would try to get the distributor back as close to where it was before, either that or start over from scratch with the timing setting, then concentrate on finding the first problem.

Do like Mike said first to make sure it's getting spark.
You may just have it flooded now and need to remove the spark plugs to see.

Hey again shouldnt it fire at the plugs even if the timing is off tried to test firing at plug with test light but no light when I turned over motor.

lol....you are feeding your 12 volt test light thousands of volts when you do what you said you did. At best there would be a tiny flash as the light filament vaporized. Not recommended for long bulb life. :)