electrical and ignition Keeping Your Eye On The (Timing) Ball.

[jjbunn]

I'm 5' 11" and find it difficult to see down the flywheel cover hole to spot the timing ball, when standing at the side of the car.

 

Has anyone had success with this: do you stand on a box, use a mirror, or a webcam, or what?!

[esty]

dear hubby, steve just changed heads on one of his o2's and he tried all types of contortions, and stools to see the bouncing ball to no avail...3 neighbors also tried to see a ball and none could...

 

i don't think his o2 truck has the ball...he finally just tuned it by ear and had a beer

[ndog]

drill a hole

however if you have a aftermarket flywheelIO dont.

Edited August 5, 2013 by ndog

[M3M3M3]

it is there, and it does not take anything special to see it.  look straight down the hole.  if you can't see the OT mark or the ball there is something wrong.  turn the engine over by hand while looking for it.  when you see it, mark it with bright paint dot.  or when engine is running, slowly stick the end of a coat hanger in the hole.  it will hit the ball first, scraping it clean and making it stand out.

[nbcbird]

Drill a hole in the lip of the firewall (under the hook latch opening).

[bnam]

Just use the crank pulley.  While the smaller dia of the pulley can reduce the accuracy a tad, there is +/-2 deg tolerance in the distributor curve per the factory manual.

 

I used a stool to step higher and get no top of the opening.  On my Tii, the fuel return hose also gets in the way so had to tie that up out of the way first.  The results were about the same in my case.

 

B

[Robotin]

^^^ i just use the crank pulley, i painted a white line on the pulley to match it to the TDC nipple.

[Stevenc22]

The problem is the ball resides on the front edge of the flywheel and most people are looking into the hole at a backwards angle and so are missing the ball just because of the angle.

 

You can see the ball standing on the side of the car just so long as you are looking just along the line of the firewall and are focusing on the front edge of the flywheel hole.

[radio9phs]

When I swapped transmissions for the 5 speed, I put paint dots on the ball and TDC marks. I am 5'9". I can see the marks , standing on the driver's side and leaning way over. There is a challenge in getting the timing light in the right place so that light goes down the hole, but does not block my line of sight with my eyeball. Also need to try to focus sight at the bottom of the hole rather than the top, helps to make sure you are using your dominant eye, kind of like looking down a gun sight or a microscope.