'had to take the cam out of son's '71 142. Below I'll tell some of the things I found. After all was assembled, with timing marks on the two gears aligned as described (Haynes), I moved the crank to set about 10 degrees BTDC with piston #1 at compression stroke (determined by feeling pressure at spark plug hole #1 with my thumb). 'attached light at low voltage wire between coil and distributor and rotated distributor (ignition on) until light went on. As I read it, that should be close enough in ignition timing to start the car. Am I right?

Car still won't start, but I wanted to see if the procedure I used was right. If it is I need to look for another source of difficulty. Spark sequence is 1-3-4-2, right? Number 1 terminal in distributor is the one pointing to the front close to the block, right?

We started taking pieces off the car as peculiarities showed. I've already described the cam gear and the mess the guy made of it. The water pump gasket was "glued" to the pump and the block with some kind of adhesive that became hard as a rock. It took a long time to get stuff cleaned off. A silicone sealer was used on the timing cover along with the gasket. It was all pushed clear of the gasket, so there was no space needing to be sealed in the first place. He coulda had the stuff get into the oil passages and messed up a bunch of things, I guess. Head bolts were installed with washers of various thicknesses and materials. Head bolts had anti-sieze comppound on the threads and it was so thick we had some trouble getting th junk out of the block. Rocker arms were set so there was no clearance whatsoever. It had a Weber downdraft setup on it. That's where our adventure started.

This guy knows even less than I do.

If you would tell me if I'm right or tell me where I'm wrong about the timing, etc., I'd really appreciate it.

Thanks,

Jim Hampton