hi everyone.

i signed up today because i need some help with my 72 914. my car wont run. ive had it a little while and am saving up for insurance. while im waiting ive been cleaning and waxing the the car when im not at school or work.

the carbs were running rough so a a friend of mine who has two vws came over. he said we needed to adjust the distributor so we pulled it out.

now ive learned that my friend is a moron.

whats the right way to put my distributor back in?

First clean the advance plate inside the dizzy to make sure the advance works smoothly.
Then re install it and using a timing light, re time the engine.

1. Buy a Haynes manual (it has text and images of process)

2. Bring engine to TDC #1 - stick finger in spark plug hole #1 - rotate engine till you start to feel compression - bring TDC mark on impeller (fan) into notch in blower housing.

3. Stick dizzy back in hole (it will only go in one way as the drive is offset) - make sure rotor is pointing to #1 tower on dizzy cap.

4. Start engine - set timing to 27 degrees BTDC @ 3000 rpm.

ill buy a book this week.

what is TDC? by tower do you mean where the plug wire goes? maybe i have the wrong cap there are no numbers on it.

TDC = Top Dead Center (piston is fully up in the bore on compression stroke)

Cap doesn't have numbers and doesn't care. The rotor needs to point to one of the towers (where the plug wire goes) and that wire goes to #1 spark plug. The remaining plugs wires are placed in the cap (clockwise rotation) in sequential firing order.

The only reason that you need to set the dizzy in a specific location (if you are running a vacuum advance dizzy) is so there is enough rotation of the dizzy to obtain the timing necessary before the vacuum can hits something.

If you are running an 009 or 050 without vacuum advance ... the above doesn't make any difference.

thank you Geoff and Ron. ill get the book and my friend says i can borrow a timing light but he doesnt know how to use it. he said he has the book for it so i should be able to figure it out.

and don't us a chop stick to find top dead center!

like a chop stick from a chineese restaurant?

why would anyone put that in a sparkplug hole??????

it's from an old classic thread, old joke about chopsticks

All good advise above, mine is to learn to work on it yourself.



And Ron had the best, it will walk you thru most repairs.

Oh and

We all have friends like that

Does your school have a auto shop? Or check with a local communtity collage and see if they have a night class on basic auto repair. Both are a good source for help & tools.

Once you have the book .....all a engine needs to run is fuel, air and spark. We can help you figure it out.

If you haven't mucked around with the mechanical bits before, you can do worse than reading John Muir's VW "Idiot Book". It explains things pretty well in language that ordinary humans can understand, and is an amusing read as well.

And yes, not everything he says is appropriate for our cars, but a lot of the general info is.

--DD

during your book buying spree, purchase either the weber book from cbperfomance or a similar book if your carbs are dells. if you have a camera, post a few pictures of your carbs, linkage, and the distributor that are on your engine. if you have a bosch 009 distr, they are easy to 'clock' for the install. the more info you provide, the easier it will be to steer you thru this. it's not as daunting as it might appear.

k

Since these cars are so old, there have normally been a few "upgrades" that have been made that you need to think about when you are going to time the engine. You may even have a new(er) distributor.

It sounds like you have carbs, so that's a start. Here is an article on how to set the timing
http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarticles/9...iming_carbs.htm

It took me a while to understand how points work (important to the timing)- the main thing to remember is that as the engine rpms increase, then points will move, and adjusts the distributor for you. The points are normally fully in play at 3200 rpms. This means that you need to have someone rev the car up to 3200 rpms, while you stick your head in the engine and set the timing.


another important thing to note is the dwell angle (it's a part of the points). If you didn't mess with too much stuff inside the distributor, then you can probably not worry about this, but if you did take the cap off, and adjust the points inside, then it would be a good idea to have a look at this:
http://www.pelicanparts.com/techarticles/9.../914_timing.htm
(note that the timing in the above article is for a stock fuel injected car - not one with carbs)

one last thing - it is possible to put the distributor in 180 degrees from where it should be, and this will be pretty bad for the engine. Take your time when you are putting it back in.

Actually, I don't think it is possible to put the dizzy in 180* off without removing the dizzy drive gear
The drive on the bottom of the dizzy is asymmetric and only can mate with the gear one way

The drive dog and slot are indeed offset--it should be impossible to put in backwards... But as it turns out, there seems to be enough slop in some cases that you can!

--DD

Get the books and read/understand how things work. Once you understand what is doing what and why, then repair becomes much much easier. Things you could spend some time reading about regarding ignition:

timing advance/retard
top dead center
point gap
dwell angle
distributor advance plate
mechanical advance
vacuum advance
ignition/power stroke

Searching for these keywords on Google will give you loads of sites that describe what's going on inside your distributor.

it can be put in were it kinda feels like its in and if you push down and turn the rotor it will rotate and the drop in solid.