heh, and here I thought you would like my sig better. ha ha.

 

oh, i know exactly where my wires go when thecar was able start. its just not starting now. i think it might be because i tryed to start it when i had the wires a differnnt way i saw online. but right now the wires are in the postion they were in when the car started. but it just wont start now. and i took the number 1 plug out and put the wire on it and layed it against a few metal parts(valvecover/carberator..etc.) and there was no spark.

 

Oh, I do.I just didn't notice it beforemy last post. Good one!

 

c4maro, just laying it on something won't necessarily get you a spark, you need it held to a good solid clean ground source. Do you have a timing light? You can use the light to check for spark as you crank.
OR, put your tongue on the open wire and.....on second thought, better not.

 

so am i keeping my wires in the same spot as they were when the car started? and do i try to start my car when i get the rotor facing the number 1 sparkplug hole and the groove facing near the timing tabs?

 

O.K. Just to make 100% sure you're not getting ANY spark let's do this. Take a couple of feet of wire, strip off about an inch or more of insulation. Enough to make sure that you can wrap it around the threaded area. Then take the other end and put it to a 100% sure ground. Turn the car over. If there's no fire you're not getting spark to your fuel.

Camaro 69> Correct me if I'm wrong with this but it doesn't matter where Number 1 is on the cap as long as the firing order is correct in the cap. The cap rotates clockwise so you can shift all the cables over by one and it would still fire correctly if in the correct sequence. The only thing that would need to be fixed would be timing since you'd be shifting the timing by about 15 degrees from one point to the next one over. Now this would make it actually start easier since you'd be retarding the timing. It should still pick up and fire the engine but you'd tell the timing was retarded. You can even get the engine to run in reverse rotation if you reversed the firing pattern with the wires in the correct sequence from what I'm told.

As long as his cables are in correct sequence he should be able to start the car. The only thing is if he's off one way or the other and it will either retard or advance the timing by about 10 - 15 degrees either way.

 

ok. i shaved some metal on the top of the wheel well where that thing is that looks like a speaker and i touched the threaded part of the plug against it. no spark.

 

That "speaker" area is your shock tower if I'm thinking correctly. Either that or your flux capacitor.

 

Sorry man, but per your signature I gotta correct you...
When the timing marks are at TDC, compression stroke, the rotor Needs to be pointing at the #1 plug wire terminal on the cap. If you were to remove all the wires from the cap and reinstall them advanced one terminal clockwise as you say, that won't work.Firing order is 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2, so thenwith the #1 pistonbeing at TDC and wanting to fire, the rotor will now be pointing to the #2 plug wire.
One full rotation of the distributor is 360 degrees. Divide that by 8 (the number of cylinders) and each position on the cap advances by 45 degrees...it ain't gonna run that way.
Could be what you are thinking is that when installing a distributor, it doesn't matter where you drop it in as long as the rotor points to #1 at TDC compression stroke.
c4maro....I think you need to go back and re-read our small novelette here, and soak it all in. Look at the diagrams that were posted. And/or sketch it out yourself if it helps.

 

Next, double check all your wires externally of your distributor and make sure they're making 100% connections. I asked you this once before but does your distributor have a coil inside the cap or is it external and hooked to the firewall/engine or somewhere else? If you're running HEI (coil in distributor cap) and you don't have the correct "snap in" connectors you could've confused the tach and the coil wires since they're both single spade connectors. An HEI distributor will only have 8 connectors on the top for the eight spark plugs. An external coil distributor will most of the time have 9 with the center one going off to the coil.