does anyone have a reliable, easy and quick way to find top dead center? i pulled my engine apart, and am now having trouble indexing the distributor. i got one of the top dead center locators, but it doesn't seem to work too well, and the engine is very hard to turn by hand. any help is greatly appreciated.

 

welcome to thirdgen.org. i find TDC by attaching a mag indicator base to the deck and putting the indicator on the piston, it's easy to see if it's going up or down watching the needle go around the dial. you can also bolt a piece of steet across the bore a nd use another bolt/jam nut arangement as a positive piston stop.

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ICON Motorsports
1st & 3rd
MM Black Diamond 538 F&AM

 

By chance when you turned the engine did you remove the spark plugs it makes the job much easier and since i have striped the central bolt on the crank pulley on my last engine i just turn the engine with the alt. pulley. It is just easier for me like that, but you might need to have serpentine belt to do that i don know. I just got finished finding tdc and i used a stick, like one of those long match sticks and i turn it over with my finger on the spark plugs hole and when i fell pressure i let go and stick the stick down there not to far about 2-3 inches in and you can feel the piston go up and when it starts to go down you know where tdc is and you can compare to tap and see if it is accurate. Hope this helps too and welcome to the board most people can be very helpful here.
Danny

 

Today's helpful hint:

The keyways cut in the crankshaft snout are in line with the #1 throw on the crank. When the keywat in the harmonic balancer is at the 45° position, the #1 cylinder is at TDC.

Determining wheter it is on the compression or exhaust stroke is your business.

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Later,
Vader
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