Just finished up a sohc to dohc swap in my 240 and car won't fire up......

[zerepdivad]

Ok I just bought a "motor swap" and we swapped it all and everything as far as that went fine. We hooked up all of the sensors and did NOTHING to the motor before throwing it in that would affect it's running or not running. One thing i did notice to be odd is that the distributor was all the way "retarded" and that is the way they gave me it and they claimed it was "pulled from a running vehicle" Everything is hooked up and it cranks and gets spark, and we believe fuel as well since we pulled the feed line and it gets fuel. It cranks over like no tomorrow but it will not start. At most a pop or 2 but that is it. We all believe it to be timing related, and are unsure as to why they would have had the timing completely retarded. All sensors are hooked up all the small grounds are hooked up and it cranks very well. So there's a few questions i got then.

1) The fuel line which has the fuel filter on it connects to which line on the fuel rail? The one that goes to the regulator? Or does it go to the other one?

2) Why would they have had the timing all the way retarded? This motor did appear to be 100% stock, and still had like ac, power steering and all that crap on there. But it did appear to at one point have the timing chain changed because we see red rtv around the timing cover and oil pan.

3)Is this a common problem when doing a sohc to dohc swap? I've read all the write ups and what not and followed all the guidelines, and it's just not firing up. Mounting it up and everything was simple but it's just not firing up. There is spark and we believe fuel as well, but for some reason no combustion.......

Thanks in advance to anyone who replies.

[Brandon93240]

Roll engine over to tdc on the number one. Pull the dizzy cap and see where the rotor is in alignment with the number one plug wire poll on the cap. It sounds like someone either misaligned the distributor when they did the timing chain or someone pulled it out and the salvage yard and put it back in when you bought it.

[sideways24d]

yeah check the timing, i had a similar problem

[DALAZ_68]

deffinetly sounds like a timing situation

just use the TDC guids in the 240 technical section of this forum...itll tell u with detail how to set tdc and what to look for ...

[zerepdivad]

Ok well i'll check the timing. I posted this up on another forum and one guy said i can use a timing light even if it doesn't idle or turn on to see if it's all aligned right is that true? I always thought that it had to be idling in order to use a timing gun. But either way guys thanks for all the responses so far, i'll check the timing this afternoon once i can get a timing gun from my friend. But needless to say i'm pissed off since i thought it'd just drop right in and i didn't think it was going to not be timed. But i guess that's how it goes with used engines..... But i'll post back up how it goes and if it doesn't get better i might even take some video or something......

[zerepdivad]

Ok well i got it started up finally. Turns out i forgot about the wiring under the dash. Still need to adjust timing a bit though and plug up a few vacuum lines but other than that the motor sounds healthy. I'm gonna drive it a day or two N/A then i'm gonna start slapping my turbo stuff onto the *****. So that should be fun. hopefully i get it going before the snow falls here......

[sideways24d]

looks like your too late man we got 2 in. already down here i'm sure it's worse there in elkhorn

[zerepdivad]

looks like your too late man we got 2 in. already down here i'm sure it's worse there in elkhorn

Yeah the snow really sucks.... couldn't have come at a worse time for me..... oh well i guess it will give me more time to do everything carefully and take my time with it.