Kenny911

.... and then something goes wrong and you don't know if it's related to what you did?

Just did the water pump. Followed the procedure to the letter (including installing flywheel lock). I'm sure everything went back as it should.

Car is hard to start. When it does, the exhaust goes phut, phut, phut and contiues like that rapidly and it doesn't sound healthy. On the road the power is low but the rev counter shows considerably higher reading than one would expect from the engine note.

There was one morning (pre-water pump change) when the car felt pretty rough. HT leads don't look great and I'm wondering if disturbing them has affected performance. They all give a positive spark test. Usual stuff like fuel delivery seems ok.

1. Is this likely to be anything to do with timing (i.e. out enough to affect performance but not enough to bend valves)?
2. Would dodgy HT lead(s) cause this type of problem?
3. Would dodgy distributor cap/rotor cause this type of problem?

Thanks very much for any help you can offer.

Kenny

AznDrgn

check your timing.

Jfrahm

Sounds like the cam timing is off a bit.

tifosiman

It sounds as if you are one tooth off on your timing belt.

Kenny911

Thanks guys. Just so that I am sure. Is it ok for me to lock the crank at TDC, remove the timing belt and turn the cam sprocket (obviously independently of the crank) to line up with the appropriate mark on the distributor housing? Thanks again for your advice.

Kenny

944_S_TYPE

Jack up the car again, remove the lower flywheel cover(2 bolts)
1) Line up the flywheel to the #1Cyl TDC MARK.
2)then take off the plug wires, dist cap(leave rotor on)
3) remove the metal dist. cover. It should look like the attached pictures.....

yoyoguy2

yes, there's no other way to do it. be careful, but don't worry too much, you'd have to really crank on the timing gear to damage anything by hand.

KLR

Sounds exactly like what I experienced when I was one tooth off. Depending on which way you skewed the timing, you might notice that the low end is stronger but the high end is terrible, or vice versa.