Hello all.

I haven't posted much, but have learned a great deal from many on these boards.

One thing I have finally learned from reading posts on this board is where to find the timing tab on my LG4. Un-stinking-believable where GM decided to put that tab!

Well, now that I have found the tab, I can't read the thing. I mean I don't know which point is for what degree of timing!

I have looked in my Helm's service manual, Chilton, Clymer, and Haynes but they don't show the same timing tab that I'm seeing. I even scanned several Internet search engines before turning here.

I guess I could pull the water pump and clean the tab. Maybe someday when I have nothing better to do and want to replace the timing chain. For now, I was hoping to take an easier path and ask on the board.

Looking at the tab from the top of the engine, starting on the passenger side, I see three evenly spaced points then a gap and another point toward the driver side of the tab.

Could someone please tell me what the degree markings should be?

Should I forget about using the tab and just do it by ear (i.e. advance till ping and back off a bit)? When doing it by ear, am I to listen for the ping at idle while turning the dist. CCW?

Also, I know that the idle needs to be set while the car is in drive. That's tough to do when I'm the only one working on the car. I just don't trust my parking brake enough to stand in front of the car even with chocks. Reverse is a different story. The e-brake holds good.

Would reverse put the same load on the engine to set the idle or is there something special about putting the car in drive?

And one more thing. . .

Is there any special trick to connecting a tach to an ignition running with a MSD 6A? Or does the standard negative side of coil and ground work okay?

Thanks for reading this far. I know I've asked a lot in one post.

Thanks for any help you can give!

Joe

 

Gap = 0

Marks toward pass side = advance in 2 degree increments

With the 6A it's a hassle to get a tach to work, they usually read about 10 times what they should... there's a terminal you use, and there's an adapter to hook it up to your factory tach.

 

I just did the timing chain on my LG4 beater. It had 110,000 miles and boy did it need it! The chain was REALLY loose and the cam gear was actually missing teeth and the rest of them were cracked/cracking. Anyways I did a new chain, set timing correctly (it was off with the loose chain) and WOW does the motor run better now, and good gas mileage has returned!!!!

BTW, I cleaned my timing cover mark as I did the project, and boy was it hard to clean, the grease was there in hardened layers. You really don't need to see the numbers on it though...all you need to do is set the timing right in the middle of the bigger gap. That's 0 degrees and where the motor should be.

 

Not really, mine works just fine without any sort of adapter.

 

My tach works fine too...Just gotta know where to cut the wire :-).

 

I wanted to write back to thank everyone who replied.

Just knowing where to read 0 degrees is a big help. The less time spent leaning over a running AC compressor the better.

As far as setting the idle is concerned, I figure I can do it myself by backing the rear tires against one of those concrete blocks you find in parking lots, apply the emergency brake, put chocks behind the front wheels, and put her in reverse. That should load the engine enough to get a good idle setting.

Regarding the tach, I really wasn't clear about what kind of tach I meant. I was talking about engine test gear used along with a timing light. I did break down and buy a digital timing light with tach and advance built in.

Again, thanks!

Joe