jscotty

My car is a 94 Vert 5.0 H.0. with a 5-speed and the GT package. What does it take to service and/or rebuild a distributor? Or would I do better buying a used one?

The PO told me that the car had a timing issue and that his mechanic said that something might be wrong with the distributor and wanted over $1000 to diagnose and repair the problem.

I'll start with changing the cap, button, coil, plugs and wires but is there anything on the distributor that can be replaced or is it more cost effective to find another one?

AdderMk2

AFAIK the distributor is pretty cheap, but some of the reman'ed ones can be pretty crappy.

Where EXACTLY in MD are you located. We have some long time veteran members of this board that live in MD, two of whom work in prefessional repair shops. perhaps they could help you out for significantly cheaper than the other tech quoted

jscotty

Thanks! I am in Prince George's County which is in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area. I'd even pay someone a few bucks to get some advice on doing it myself.

To make it cheaper and simple I thought about just replacing every electrical component from the plugs to the pickup coil as my way of permanently solving the problem vs. getting a diagnoisis provided that there isn't an ECM problem.

Is this a realistic way of handling the problem or am I being too optimistic?

AdderMk2

take a look in the tech articles here on the forum... it is chock full of good info that might help you out a bit

mjr46

I'm sure I could diagnose and repair your car for far less, PM me for details and or the exact prob you are having, I work in frederick and specialize in repair of mustangs

jscotty

Thanks for the responses guys. Since my last post on this thread I've gotten the car started and I see exactly what the PO is talking about. The car runs very rough so the timing is going to be the first thing that I will assess.

My next question:

Today I removed the outer ring of the balancer because it became disconnected from the inner ring and it was just spinning freely and making a bunch of noise. So at this point I don't have any reference marks to adjust the distributor. How precise is the adjustment? Can I guestimate the setting by first loosening the bolt and the starting the engine and turning the distributor back and forth until the engine stops idling rough? I've done it this way on a couple of GM V8's that I've owned but in some of the threads that I've read on here, I see most of you are advising to first make sure that it's anywhere from 10-12 degrees TDC before tweaking it with a timing gun. I don't plan on racing this car down the strip, I just want to be able to get it in and out of my driveway as needed until I have the opportunity to install a new balancer.

Thanks for the offer! I might take you up on it if I don't have any success.

Yeah, I've been reading a lot of it since I first started this thread. But can you point me towards some threads that are directly related to my issue? I wouldn't want someone to type/re-type out anything that has already been addressed. Thanks!

Joel5.0

.... DO NOT turn the engine on w/out replacing the HARMONIC BALANCER, engine damage can and will occur if you do.

mjr46

follow Joel5.0's instructions OP!!!!!!........DO NOT MESS with distributor timing until balancer is fixed!!!!!

AdderMk2

like joel said... you shouldnt even start the car again until you replace that balancer... have a couple friends come over and push it out of the way if you cannot fix it now

jscotty

I see.

Gotcha.

Understood. Points taken. Thank you very much! I shall heed your warnings.

Once I get the new balancer installed then I will revisit the timing issue.