i am rebuilding a runabout with 81 3.0 mercruiser. It would start good idle and run good to 2000 rpm where it would start to cut out and then back fire.
With the help of my SELOC manual I cleaned and rebuilt the carbs. found a few minor issues there that improved idle and all but still nothing after 2000 rpm.
Ahhhhh haaaa.. Pulled the distributor cap off. points look new, cap looks good, rotor arm looks new. srews to capacitor wire are loose, never tightened. fixed this reinstalled.
Runs smoother, and will now throttle to 3000, more if I pushed it.
When I checked my plugs and compression I found number 4 plug to be alittle bit white while the rest looked normal. With this said i wanted to verify the timing.
This is where my question comes in. the timming is way up before not even on the scale for the marks. maybe and inch to an inch and a half from the scale. I am on cyl 1 at the front bow of the engine. I checked the seloc book for the setting and it says 6 degrees BFTDC for all the 3.0s except the lx is 8. Check the forroms here cant find much of an answer but found one suggestion that said 1 degree after tdc. I found a video from a shop on utube setting timing and in the video they are saying 1 before TDC.
Can someone please tell me beyond I doubt were the timing should be set? Or is my timing good now?
Thank you in advance engine repair gods!
Robert
Wood River IL
With the help of my SELOC manual I cleaned and rebuilt the carbs. found a few minor issues there that improved idle and all but still nothing after 2000 rpm.
Ahhhhh haaaa.. Pulled the distributor cap off. points look new, cap looks good, rotor arm looks new. srews to capacitor wire are loose, never tightened. fixed this reinstalled.
Runs smoother, and will now throttle to 3000, more if I pushed it.
When I checked my plugs and compression I found number 4 plug to be alittle bit white while the rest looked normal. With this said i wanted to verify the timing.
This is where my question comes in. the timming is way up before not even on the scale for the marks. maybe and inch to an inch and a half from the scale. I am on cyl 1 at the front bow of the engine. I checked the seloc book for the setting and it says 6 degrees BFTDC for all the 3.0s except the lx is 8. Check the forroms here cant find much of an answer but found one suggestion that said 1 degree after tdc. I found a video from a shop on utube setting timing and in the video they are saying 1 before TDC.
Can someone please tell me beyond I doubt were the timing should be set? Or is my timing good now?
Thank you in advance engine repair gods!
Robert
Wood River IL
