New to group, trying to fix up a stock '79 AMC Cherokee 360

[Red]

Hi everyone!

I inherited a '79 AMC Jeep Cherokee two door 360 and have had a bastard of a time getting the timing right on it. I think I'm close to fixing it, and I'm persistant enough to eventually get it right, but I'm worried that in trying to start it so often I've fouled the plugs and can see a lot of deposits on my pistons through the spark plug holes.

It all started when my stock ignition coil went bad. I replaced it - and noticed that the new one didn't come with this resistor or capacitor looking thing that bolts to the coil mount and attaches to the positive terminal on the coil. Is that necessary with all coils?

I then found that the also stock ignition control unit was bad too, and replaced that. While I was replacing the whole ignition system I figured I might as well pull the distributor and make sure everything looked good. When I was pulling the spark plug wires, I noticed that whatever shop my folks had taken it to had wired all the plugs one connector counter-clockwise and moved the distributor housing around to compensate for it. Is this common? While I had it out, my girlfriend decided to try starting my truck. As I heard it cranking, I realized I never even put a mark on the engine for where the distributor housing was supposed to be. I totally lost timing at that point, and I haven't gotten it to start since.

I had a friend come over that supposedly knew what he was doing, who mixed up the left and right banks of cylinders so everything was wired totally wrong and we tried starting it for a few days making minor tweaks to the distributor housing to try and get it to start, of course no dice there. ;) If you're facing the engine from the front of the truck, on a 360 plug 1 is on the right front of the engine, right?

This thing is gonna be a real lot of hard work to bring back up, but I'm dedicated to doing it. There are still stickers on the glovebox I put there coming back from the dentist at 5 years old. ;)

Also, I don't like the Air Conditioning unit on my engine, and I'd like to remove it to free up space so I can see the timing marks better. However, it looks like there's a bracket that connects the AC unit to the support the alternator and it also looks like it's part of the block. If I pull off the AC unit, does it expose any water/oil routes?

Sorry for the huge post, I'm just really happy to have found a group to talk about this stuff with. Thanks for reading this far. :)
-Jon

[mrtazwrench]

we'll try to do what we can to help, as for the cyl #1 you will see one valve cover slightly ahead of the other, the farthest ahead one is #1, and all the odd cyls are on that bank, firing order is 1-8-4-3-6-5-7-2, same as chev small block. if you need any parts for it i'm parting several fullsize jeeps.

[Red]

Thank you very much for the help! I got it timed pretty much - on the compression stroke on cylinder #1 I cranked it to the TDC timing mark on the engine and then aligned the #1 cylinder on the distributor cap/housing to where the needle was pointed inside..

Tightened it all down and fired it up, only to have what sounds like a gear in the starter slip free juuuuuuust as it sounds it's about to turn over. Every time, just as it's about to start goin', the starter just starts spinnin' off on it's own. It doesn't sound like any gears are grinding or anything, just like they slip apart completely and the starter spins freely on it's own. I have the original shop manual for this pig so I'll see if it has anything to say, but has anyone come across this before?

Thanks again!
Jon

[bushwackertn]

For your starter problem it sounds like either your starter gear is not kicking in at all, or you have teeth missing on your fly-wheel or starter gear. While you had the dist. out did you notice the gear on the end of it, did it look o.k. or were the teeth chewed up, and did you lube it before you put it back in? Those cam and dist. (dizzy) gears are bad for getting chewed up. If an amc engine sets for a long time you would be money ahead if you pulled the dist. and lubed the cam and dizzy gear before you try to start the engine. Just something to think about.

[Red]

Gonna start pullin' the starter out today, the dist gear looked like it was in great shape, but I wasn't aware ya needed to lube it. What sorta lube would be best?

[bushwackertn]

I always just dip the end of the dist. in a bottle of motor oil so that the dist. gear gets a good coating of oil on it and then install the dist. You don't have to do this unless it has been setting around for a while. Assembly lube would work even better if you have some around.

[Red]

It's not too bad, it's been sitting about 4 months with me occasionally coming along and trying to get it started, so it was getting cranked over at least a few times a month. I don't recall seeing motor oil on the gear though, I'll dip 'er once I get this starter thing sorted out and see it runnin'. :razz:

The worst thing I'm gonna have to deal with is that the whole exhaust manifold/muffler/exhaust pipe/etc has recently rusted through. Oops. Cha-ching. :smile: