Chevy 4.3 no start condition.

[R18Civic]

My buddy has a 97 olds bravada with a 4.3 vortec.

We replaced the lower intake gaskets, put everything back together and have been dealing with a no start condition.

The timing is correct, we have spark from the coil, we have fuel pressure but it won't fire.

Intermittent puff of air from the intake, and have yet to check the plugs for fuel saturation

 

[The Critic]

Have you checked for injector pulse?
Check and see if the engine will run briefly on brake/carb cleaner.

 

[Fastcompany]

Is everything plugged in? Sometimes it's easy to miss something. Use a generic code reader to see if you have any faults. A puff out the intake usually means timing is off. Don't know how to check injector pulse i believe that engine uses the spider injection. You usually don't end up with a bad component putting something back together so sorry to say you missed a connection or did something wrong in the job.

 

[R18Civic]

All I can figure is somehow valve timing is off with the distributor timing.
Everything is lined up as far as the front cover timing marks and distributor timing.

I really don't give a [censored] what it is, I originally didn't agree to having him over here because he's dumb, hardheaded, won't listen and breaks [censored]. He's been a good friend so I caved and now I'm stuck with an ugly [censored] Oldsmobile in my driveway

 

[Fastcompany]

Is the distributor timing 180 off? Easy to do if the motor was spun at all. Your valve timing can't change unless you pulled that big gear off the front.

 

[Fastcompany]

Put cylinder one on tdc with the valves closed that should be #1 firing. Your distributor rotor should be pointing at #1 terminal on your cap. To find out if your valves are closed on #1 put your finger over the spark plug hole while someone's spinning the motor with a wrench. It should start to blow your finger off the hole. The insert say a small screwdriver into the spark plug hole and spin the motor again by hand until the screw driver is pushed the furthest out.this should also be the tdc mark on your balancer.

 

[R18Civic]

You sure about that? All the videos and articles I can find about the 4.3 say the rotor should point at the 6 printed on the lip of the distributor itself. There's also an 8 printed there for the 5.0 and 5.7s v8s TDC

 

[mk378]

And when you put the cap on with the engine at TDC1, the rotor must point at wire #1.

 

[Fastcompany]

I don't know what your talking about but ya the terminal with #1 spark plug wire on it should have the rotor pointing at it when the cylinder is up. I'm willing to bet you have it 180 degrees out. Which all your timing marks would line up except you would be firing on the exhaust stroke instead of compression. Like I said very easy to do if someone bumped the starter or turned the motor while the distributor was out.but really a cheap a cheap code reader can be your friend in finding stuff left unplugged an open circuit fault means you left that particular component unplugged. I always start there when your scenerio presents itself to me.usually a 2 second fix after overhauling an engine. And maybe someone here is more familiar with that engine. Does anyone know if it uses a module in the distributor or if it has a crank sensor. If it has a module you need to use a timing light you can't just set it to some mark. Been a long time since I worked on a vortec

 

[R18Civic]

We probably have it 180 off then. He marked the rotor but decided to replace it last minute and eyeballed it upon install.

Well just pull the #1 plug and then align the marks

 

[Fastcompany]

Sounds good. Let us know what you find.

 

[mk378]

Another common way to end up with a no-start after major disassembly is to forget to reattach a ground wire.

 

[R18Civic]

We didn't take any ground wires lose, just the clips and harnesses. My money is on 180 off valve timing wise. Getting ready to head home and pull the #1 plug. Had to send him home last night. He wouldn't listen and kept removing the dist, bumping the starter and reinstalling the dist hoping it would randomly end up on #1 tdc. All it did was kill the battery.

 

[R18Civic]

Got it to 1 tdc but now the oil pump shaft is off almost 90 degrees. No luck finding the slot to turn it.

 

[R18Civic]

Getting this sucker lined up may end up driving me nuts, about ready to slap him upside the head for replacing the cap. If it aint broke don't fix it.

 

[R18Civic]

She's running. He gave up with timing it perfectly, it's running a few degrees advanced but he just wants to get it home and I'm fine with that.

 

[R18Civic]

Timing was close enough that the ecm compensated for it, no Cel light illuminated. As irritated as I am I am grateful for this experience seeing as how I've never messed with a distributor before, easier to do than people make it sound. Just extremely time consuming.

 

[Fastcompany]

Glad to hear you got it. Ya the oil pump can be a little tricky but your golden now.