My 81 Camaro will only ping while driving, it won't ping in park and when i turn the car off it runs on i have to put it into drive and shut it off without it running on, i think its a timing issue but i have never timed a car before can someone give me step by step in how to time it? i have a shop book and its says Timing (BTDC) 6? what does this mean?

and also the RPM are off like in park it will idle at 1400 then when you put it into drive it drops down to 900 how can i fix this

Thanks

 

If conditions are wrong, an engine will ping while under a load (driving), not while it's idling. There are a few things that can cause it to ping.
1) The ignition timing, and yours may be too far advanced. Do you have a timing light?
2) Running with a lower octane gas than what the engine requires. You can try one step up in octane and see if that takes care of it.
3) A build up of carbon on the pistons and/or the combustion chamber of the heads, which actually raises your compression ratio. If you have a carbon build up, it can start to glow red hot as the engine is running, and that could also be the cause of your run-on (dieseling).
With your idle being so high, I'm inclined to think your timing is set too far advanced. Doesn't your book have pictures to show what the timing marks look like? Follow the setup procedure in the book. Your car was the first year for having a computer, so it may tell you to disconnect a certain wire from the distributor. Hook the timing light up to the #1 plug wire (front most drivers side). Loosen the distributor hold down clamp and slowly turn the distributor to get the line on the balancer to line up with the 6 degrees BTDC mark on the timing tab. Rotating the distributor clockwise retards the timing (probably where you need to go), and counter-clockwise advances timing. Then tighten the clamp back down and road test it.

 

yea i picked up a timing light the other day, i tried putting better gas in ( Sunoco Gold 94 Octane) and didn't make a difference, no the book does not have any pictures to show me and my 81 is a Canadian model those where not equipped with (Computer Command Control), so basically i have to line the mark on the harmonice balancer with 6 on the timing tab?

 

Also forgot to add the Engine is not stock its been rebuild. i don't know what kind of pistons are in it but it does have a higher lift cam, here is a video of the car runing http://www.metacafe.com/watch/276137...maro_z28_hypo/

 

You can't follow stock specs with a modified engine. First check to see where the timing is set at now. Then if it's high, back it down a couple of degrees at a time and see what it does. Another thing, what kind of distributor do you have? Mechanical advance or vacuum? If vacuum, where is the line hooked up to? You also don't know at how many degrees your distributor is fully in, is it advancing too far overall? You would need either timing tape on the balancer, or a dial-back timing light. But, that may or may not be a problem, so I wouldn't sweat it yet until you see what setting the base timing does.
Do you have an automatic transmission? There is an old school brake torque way to find maximum advance under load, without using a timing light.

 

Its the stock distributor, the vacuum line is hooked up to the carb, if i bought the timing tape and put it on, how many degrees would i time it at? yea its turbo 350 automatic transmission

 

The timing tape is to help see how high the timing goes as the rpm's climb. A good rule to follow is to have the distributor all in at 36 degrees BTDC@3,000 rpm's. Your vacuum advances timing some initially (usually till about +/- 2,000 rpm), then the centrifugal weights take over to give full advance based on engine rpm's.

 

I was messing with the timing all day and I still couldn’t get it right, I would retarded it little by little and it was getting worse it starter to ping in park but wouldn't run on. When I advanced little by little it was running way better and wouldn’t ping but as soon as it was under load it pinged and it was running on when you shut her down, what do you think the problem is?

 

Sounding more like it could be carbon build up. How many miles does the engine have? You can try "steam cleaning" the inside and see if that helps. Take a plastic pop bottle, or equivalent, and fill it with water. With the engine running and the air cleaner off, hold the bottle over the carburetor, upside-down, with your thumb over the opening. Then let the water slowly trickle into the carb while you feather the throttle with your other hand to keep the engine from killing. You don't want to pour the water down, as that could hydro lock the engine since water doesn't compress. You want to give enough water to where you can hear the engine start to bog down, but not so much as to kill it. Giving it a small drop here and there won't do any good. If you don't feel confident doing this then don't, I don't want to hear "but he said to do it". It isn't brain surgery either though.

 

I kind of did something similar when I took the car out of storage, I got a yogurt cup and filled it about more then half and poured it into the carb and there was black smoke coming out of the exhaust, should I do it again but your way?