Ongoing no start 940 and other woes!

[kiloran]

Originally Posted by vickyg

PS what an awful place to mount the distributor

Agreed, proper fiddly to work on, unless you're 6 foot plus with ape arms

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by vickyg

That's the very hole Dave! I would say the bung was long lost as a plate had been welded over. I cannot find the plate anywhere on our yard but it's possible it got chucked in scrap. I've patch with piece of roofing and tin can with 1500C sealant and jubilees. Needed 12 hours to cure so today is the day....

I'd expected a fairly bright blue spark wouldn't you? I.e. not what I have despite all 4 sparking ;-)

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114937939563

Quickest and easiest ^^^^^ way to sort it. (Just noticed i quoted it as M14 tapped, should have read M18 tapped)

Bright blue bordering on white, yes. Certainly not yellow or orange. The white spark is a sign of higher voltage than blue though. Look at lightning - well actually don't physically look at it but it's nearer to white than blue.

Yes, a very stupid place to put the distributor! Never understood why they did that or used such obscure distributor caps made only for one or two other models globally. My 760 is the same but the dizzy is at the front of the engine so easy to get at but the cap is only shared with one or two 6 cylinder BMWs that aren't that common so again is stupidly expensive.

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by kiloran

Agreed, proper fiddly to work on, unless you're 6 foot plus with ape arms

Lifting the bonnet to the vertical position helps!

[loki_the_glt]

For a transverse engine that position makes sense. But the red-blocks are longitudinally mounted ...

British Elend (as the Germans called it) had the right idea, for once, on the O-series of driving the dizzy from the centre of the camshaft.

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by loki_the_glt

For a transverse engine that position makes sense. But the red-blocks are longitudinally mounted ...

British Elend (as the Germans called it) had the right idea, for once, on the O-series of driving the dizzy from the centre of the camshaft.

True but it means you can lean over the wing nearer to the dizzy at the back of the head - does make a difference.

The dizzy on the "O" series was on the front of the cam carrier when transverse mounted and on the right when longtidunally mounted. The inlet and exhaust manifolds were on the opposite side. Could it be there wasn't enough room for Volvo to do that on the red block because the AAV/AICV was in the way? Also the probably didn't want to cook the dizzy above the exhaust manifold.

However, when the head sprouted an extra 8 valves and camshaft to create the M series 16v, the dizzy moved to the front camshaft when transversely mounted. No longtidunally mounted M or T (the successor to the M, minor improvements but essentially the same) were produced sadly.

Also the PAS pump was driven off the rear camshaft left-hand end - a nightmare to change the drive pulley on it!

On the Vauxhall Family-II engines, the dizzy was mounted on the rear end of the cam in longtidunal engines but driven by a small "slave" belt so the cap actually faced forwards and was much easier to access than the red-block rear mounted dizzy.

Must be a major headache for manufacturers working out where to mount the dizzy when changing engines around as they do. Certainly a major headache for owners trying to contort themselves while changing dizzy caps etc!

[kiloran]

Give me a dizzy cap any day over a set of coil packs and attendant wiring that's (a) fragile and (b) subject to extreme bends and heat cycles. My stopgap Golf Mk4 has these and they're a right pain to work on.

[vickyg]

Actually I do have long arms and it wasn't that bad to reach with an 8mm ratchet ring spanner! If the screws weren't captive tho..

[vickyg]

Here you go folks, rotor arm porn. I think the Italian made one from EuroCP will be an improvement on this don't you

[Laird Scooby]

Originally Posted by vickyg

Here you go folks, rotor arm porn. I think the Italian made one from EuroCP will be an improvement on this don't you

I've seen worse but not often!

What stat was the carbon brush in (in the inside cente of the cap)? I'd guess worn to a very strange shape!

[vickyg]

The centre was thin and pointy! Anyways...we're back to non starting and despite much tank draining we're back to mayonnaise fuel. Took the in tank pump out this afternoon. Drained every crevice but now have no fuel and need another fuel filter. So it goes on.