69Volunteer

well I may need to pull the pan regardless. I may have it reversed in that the ring is on the oil pan side. I can pull the shaft up out of the dizzy hole until about 3/4 of the way up and it catches that ring and wont go any further. Makes more sense to have it reversed.

It still seems like the shaft will pull out of the pump when I go to prime the motor and remove the primer.

69Volunteer

I'm posting this in case anyone has this issue in the future. The shaft actually has a top and bottom. The bottom that fits into the pump is squared off while the top that fits into the distrib is tapered. The ring is at the top and I found that I had to insert the shaft into the pump and slide it into the distrib hole before boltng it to the block. You will see that if you pull the shaft from the top, it will slide up slightly but not enough to come out of the pump.