Well, I changed my timing chain and all other timing chain related components, the water pump, all belts, hoses, antifieeze. The good news is, I've turned it over enough to have developed full oil pressure and no parts went through the side of the block or cam covers. The bad news is that it's not starting, just backfiring a bit. I am absolutely certain that my wires to the plugs are correct, they've been checked against a diagram in the manual. I am a little worried, though, that I cleaned the 1/4" of gunk from my distributor and now I can't really say where it was in the "slot" for mounting it. It's my understanding that you get this "close" and the computer takes it from there.
When the distributor was replaced, the timing mark and both cams (naturally, both!) were in the 0 position and the rotor was definitely pointing at the mark on the edge of the distributor.

Questions:


Naturally, I had my fuel pump hoses (the ones crossing over the cam cover) disconnected for a long time. If I've had it reconnected and trying to start, the fuel should have returned by now, (after about 15-20 seconds of cranking and maybe a minute in the 1 position. Could this still be an issue?

Should I move the dist back and forth until I find the "sweet spot?".

Should this take some cranking to get back to "normal" or am I paranoid?

__________________
86 560SL
With homebrew first gear start!
85 380SL
Daily Driver Project

http://juliepalooza.8m.com/sl/mercedes.htm

Fuel should get there in a second or two. Since it backfires you probably have the dist in wrong. The spark is made by computer but the rotor has to be pointing at the right cylinder.

Put the crank TDC and see where the rotor points. If its not on #1 turn the motor by hand one turn to TDC and you should be on one. If you aren't there in either case you will need to remove the right VC and check when the rockers are rabbit eared on #1.

Over the years I have also seen cams get turned 180 degrees. The washer with the timing mark can go on two ways. Number one has the crank on TDC, #1 with rabbit ear lobes up and #6 rabbit ear down and the rotor pointing at the #1 terminal of the cap with both cams marks lining up.

__________________
Steve Brotherton
Continental Imports
Gainesville FL
Bosch Master, ASE Master, L1
33 years MB technician

This was probably it, I can't bear to take the cam cover off... I had the rotor pointing at the mark with #1 cylinder's lobes pointing DOWN, not UP...I think that's what you meant with the "rabbit ears"! I'm very certain that I have the cams themselves lined up correctly, because I had all 3 marks within 1 degree (with a new chain and tensioner) when I had the covers off. I don't know how the heck I screwed up the distributor.

__________________
86 560SL
With homebrew first gear start!
85 380SL
Daily Driver Project

http://juliepalooza.8m.com/sl/mercedes.htm