Itinerant Air-Cooled

go to Ratwell.com as he has posted the vacuum hose layouts with nice pictures and they're easy to read. That's what I do when I forget where they go.

those are the pics I printed out today.

question: if I put the distributor in 180* off, would that keep MZ from starting?

Anyone out there have a spare passenger side exhaust piece that goes from the heater box to the bellows? Mine is welded to the old heater box and is pretty beat up. Maybe we can do a parts swap?

misszora wrote:those are the pics I printed out today.

question: if I put the distributor in 180* off, would that keep MZ from starting?

Yes but you can get by that by changing the plug wire orientation on the cap.

misszora wrote:those are the pics I printed out today.

question: if I put the distributor in 180* off, would that keep MZ from starting?

I am not going to answer this question until you answer mine. If you, or anyone helping you wants to short-cut or second-guess, we could swim in confusion until spring.

You can answer me here if:

a) TDC #1 has been found on the engine (not distributor)
with verification that:
(hydraulic lifter engines) #3 valves both are moving opposite each other, its called overlap, when you move the engine back and forth,
(solid lifter engines) #1 valves are both clickity clickity,
and the timing notch is @ "0".

b) I DON'T CARE WHERE THE ROTOR IS!! BUT wherever it does happen to be, IS THE NUMBER ONE SPARK PLUG WIRE ABOVE IT WHEN YOU PUT THE CAP BACK ON?? If not, do it! Pull all the wires off the cap, get #1 in the terminal above the rotor and go 4/3/2 clockwise from there.

I'M NOT YELLING, I'M TYPING ...

(edited, thanks to Gypsie, 02/01 2:26am)

I felt confident that everything was correct when I installed the distributor. Just checking all possibilities right now and I will re-confirm.

misszora wrote:I felt confident that everything was correct when I installed the distributor. Just checking all possibilities right now and I will re-confirm.

Reconfirmation is not a bad thing at all.

I have installed distributors as correctly as could be, and in rotating the engine, the drive dogs did not engage properly (even though I had pushed down the distributor to seat it) . Only when I went back to double check, did I find a little 10mm nut from the breather tower had fallen under the distributor clamp and was pushing it off the case just a whisker. The distributor *looked fine* all snugly against the clamp ring. WTF? Why won't it start? Heard a backfire that made me suspect timing. No ego in the way ... rotated the engine to TDC (no distributor to verify when you don't trust the thing, right?) so I had to do the valve cover on the left side, yeeeees both valves clicky clicky, yeeees TDC notch was perfect, NOOOOOO the rotor was some silly 127* off!
Colin

misszora wrote:Anyone out there have a spare passenger side exhaust piece that goes from the heater box to the bellows? Mine is welded to the old heater box and is pretty beat up. Maybe we can do a parts swap?

yeah, buried in my parts stash in Seattle......dunno if I can get it to you before April thou.

Check the #1 cylinder that its really is TDC for #1 and if not its 180 off and swap the wires around like Colin says.

So close but yet so far. The beach is calling!!!! Get 'er done!!!

Why would #3 valves go clackety if #1 is at tdc? Yu

Gypsie wrote:Why would #3 valves go clackety if #1 is at tdc? Yu

You're right. #3 is supposed to be at OVERLAP and #1 is supposed to be clickity.
I will hand in my resignation immediately.
Colin

She's running!!!! Drove her to the Lucky Lab tonight to see if anyone was there for Tightwad Tuesday. Nope!
Bittersweet.

So here's the video of the start up and a couple minutes of the break in. Shepski really likes that it smokes...made me nervous even though I know it's OK. ;-) I'm so giddy right now. Thank you EVERYBODY for the help and support. I've still got lots to do but I may be making it to Nehalem after all. **knocking on wood**

ENJOY!
http://youtu.be/FhGrVKEMlHA

So the main culprit that kept MZ from firing up on Sunday was the placement of wires on the coil. What tipped us off was Colin's list from Sunday. The green wire was NOT on the (-) of the coil. Hmmmmmm. We looked at the picture I took of the coil during the engine drop. Look for yourselves and see if you notice anything strange.



Between me, Heather & John we realized that we had put SOME of the wires in their proper place from memory (not my memory!) and then were confused by what Colin had mentioned. We referred to my photo. Still scratching our heads, we looked at John's coil on his bus (even though he has Pertronix) and Heather's coil on her bug. We also looked at the Bentley and realized that MZ's wires were the exact OPPOSITE of what they should have been when the coil was removed. No idea why they were that way and why she was still running up until the engine drop. We thought Colin was mistaken. woops!!!

I also found a mild kink in the fuel hose leading into the fuel filter. Straighten that up and put in the new battery. Static timing was great and we used the timing gun after the break in...still idling a little high but I'm not worried.


Heather and Jerald helping out.


Trying to start her up on Sunday.

I bet I'm going to sleep well tonight.

Oh yeah, the transmission started to leak during the break in and when I drove her around the block the turn signal lever all but fell out of the steering column. WTF?

=D>

yay! sounded pretty good too