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CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 20 Jan 2011, 08:15
by thmpptrck
O.k...I have sourced a Distributor and control unit to replace the 090 thats fitted to my van (as i have been well informed its useless) i have 3 wires.. a brown with a spade connection that comes out at the Distributor end with black terminal, where does this go? Also i have a black and a green wire at the control box end i presume are attched to the coil? which to where???? can some one put me right so i dont blow the unit..

Thanks in advance

Cheers.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 20 Jan 2011, 10:30
by BOXY
Hi, I asked the same question at the end of this post viewtopic.php?f=39&t=77973 but never got an answer, hopefully someone will jump in this time?

From the Haynes manual it looks like the black spade connector goes to terminal 15 on the coil, the green one to terminal 1, and the brown is earthed to the engine casing somewhere? If we don't get an answer I'll give it a try next week and I'll let you know if anything goes bang or melts

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 20 Jan 2011, 16:03
by thmpptrck
Top man thank you....

I think its a plug and play jobbie!!

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 24 Jan 2011, 16:08
by BOXY
Hi, I fitted the dizzie and magic boxes as per the manual and nothing went bang or melted, but the van didn't start either

I'll "talk" through what I did and hopefully someone a bit more knowledgeable will jump in and tell me what could be wrong?

Firstly I popped of the dizzie cap. Then I put the van in fourth gear, let off the hand brake (on the flat) and pushed the van forward until the rotor arm pointed at the notch in the rim of the dizzie. I checked the timing mark on the crankshaft pulley was at 0' on the timing scale, and that the rotor was pointing at the quadrant of the dizzie cap connected to No 1 cylinder as well. This means the No 1 cylinder is at TDC on compression. Then I put the handbrake back on and engaged neutral.

The next stage was to remove the 009 dizzie. First I marked up its orientation in case I had to re-fit it. Next I disconnected the condenser lead from terminal 1 on the coil. Then I loosened the 14mm nut that holds the dizzie clamp to the engine casing. Be careful when removing the nut to make sure you remove the washers as well. Finally I pulled the dizzie off the engine.

Fitting the standard dizzie is the reverse of the removal procedure apart from the wiring and vac pipes. I swapped the dizzie clamp off the 009 after slacking off the 10mm pinch bolt. Next I lined the rotor arm up with the notch on the dizzie rim, and lined up the dizzie drive with the drive slot in the engine. I made sure the dizzie was fully inserted into the engine casing by gently turning the rotor arm back & forth until it 'locked" into the drive slot. I connected the brown lead to the 14mm stud and tighten up the nut. Next I connected the moulded plug on the side of the dizzie to the loom, plugged in the idle stabaliser & ignition control unit and connected the green lead to terminal 1 on the coil and the black one to terminal 15. The last thing was to connect up the vac pipe. I connected the inner connection of the vac can to the left hand carb, and the outer connection to the air box and balance pipe via a tee piece. I also connected the other air box connector to the air inlet on the right of the air box (what does this do?)

Got the vac connections the wrong way around Here's a photo of someone else's.
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m263 ... -Engin.jpg

I checked that all the timing marks were still in the right places and nipped up the 10mm pinch bolt to lock the dizzie in position. The next stage should have been start the engine and use a strobe light to get the timing spot on. Unfortunately the van wouldn't start and I didn't have a assistant handy to turn the key for me while I checked for a spark etc. Bugger!

Rather than risk not having a running van before it got dark I chucked the 009 back on, strobed up the timing and bruuum bruuum, normal service has been resumed. Now I've had a practise run I'll see if I can persuade the girlfriend to lend a hand at the weekend and I'll try again. It could well be that one of the magic boxes is dead, or the Hall sensor is u/s, or even that they're not off a CU engined van?

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 24 Jan 2011, 19:26
by bigherb
You cant do any more until you know you have a spark. Just connect the dizzy back up, pose the coil HT lead close to bare metal and turn the dizzy by hand which should produce sparks.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 24 Jan 2011, 21:51
by BOXY
If my girlfriend goes shopping at the weekend instead of helping I'll give that a try. I'm not sure if there's enough clearance around the vac can to turn it more than 25 or 35 degrees. I'd need nearly 90 degrees to trigger a spark wouldn't I?

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 25 Jan 2011, 07:11
by bigherb
No I don't mean refit the distributor. just connect the wires and turn the shaft by hand.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 25 Jan 2011, 08:48
by BOXY
Now that is something I'd never have thought of. Thanks.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 26 Jan 2011, 13:21
by thmpptrck
BOXY wrote:Hi, I fitted the dizzie and magic boxes as per the manual and nothing went bang or melted, but the van didn't start either

I'll "talk" through what I did and hopefully someone a bit more knowledgeable will jump in and tell me what could be wrong?

Firstly I popped of the dizzie cap. Then I put the van in fourth gear, let off the hand brake (on the flat) and pushed the van forward until the rotor arm pointed at the notch in the rim of the dizzie. I checked the timing mark on the crankshaft pulley was at 0' on the timing scale, and that the rotor was pointing at the quadrant of the dizzie cap connected to No 1 cylinder as well. This means the No 1 cylinder is at TDC on compression. Then I put the handbrake back on and engaged neutral.

The next stage was to remove the 009 dizzie. First I marked up its orientation in case I had to re-fit it. Next I disconnected the condenser lead from terminal 1 on the coil. Then I loosened the 14mm nut that holds the dizzie clamp to the engine casing. Be carefully when removing the nut to make sure you remove the washers as well. Finally I pulled the dizzie off the engine.

Fitting the standard dizzie is the reverse of the removal procedure apart from the wiring and vac pipes. I swapped the dizzie clamp off the 009 after slacking off the 10mm pinch bolt. Next I lined the rotor arm up with the notch on the dizzie rim, and lined up the dizzie drive with the drive slot in the engine. I made sure the dizzie was fully inserted into the engine casing by gently turning the rotor arm back & forth until it 'locked" into the drive slot. I connected the brown lead to the 14mm stud and tighten up the nut. Next I connected the moulded plug on the side of the dizzie to the loom, plugged in the idle stabaliser & ignition control unit and connected the green lead to terminal 1 on the coil and the black one to terminal 15. The last thing was to connect up the vac pipe. I connected the inner connection of the vac can to the left hand carb, and the outer connection to the air box and balance pipe via a tee piece. I also connected the other air box connector to the air inlet on the right of the air box (what does this do?)

I checked that all the timing marks were still in the right places and nipped up the 10mm pinch bolt to lock the dizzie in position. The next stage should have been start the engine and use a strobe light to get the timing spot on. Unfortunately the van wouldn't start and I didn't have a assistant handy to turn the key for me while I checked for a spark etc. Bugger!

Rather than risk not having a running van before it got dark I chucked the 009 back on, strobed up the timing and bruuum bruuum, normal service has been resumed. Now I've had a practise run I'll see if I can persuade the girlfriend to lend a hand at the weekend and I'll try again. It could well be that one of the magic boxes is dead, or the Hall sensor is u/s, or even that they're not off a CU engined van?


Got the same problem i have connected it all up and took the plug out of cylinder 1, felt for the cylinder at the top set the dizzy arm to the correct plug lead on the dizzy cap, although had to change them round from the 009, got a spark at the plug but will not fire it seems like its trying but back firing a little and coughing out some smoke!

Any help please??? will try again as it may have flooded but still noting to feel like it was going to fire!

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 26 Jan 2011, 13:55
by BOXY
It sounds like the timing is out. Moving the distributor a small amount can really make a difference to when your plug fires. When I put the 009 back on my van on Monday it started but it was running at 24' BTDC. Moving the dizzie only a few degrees brought it back to 7' BTDC. With the electronic ignition it should idle at 4-6' ATDC with the vac pipes connected.

Try moving the dizzie and couple of degrees and see if you can get it running. Once it's running you'll need a strobe light to dial it in properly. If it won't run at all after moving the dizzie bit by bit as far as you can then the static timing is probably out and it's firing on the exhaust stroke.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 26 Jan 2011, 14:59
by thmpptrck
yep done that rotated in all direction quite a way too got nothing at all... really confusing!!

Could the dizzy drive gear be out as something does not seam right....can it be adjusted???

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 26 Jan 2011, 15:40
by BOXY
Are you sure you've got No1 at TDC on compression and not on exhaust? The piston will be at the top of the cylinder for both. Checking the position by poking something in the spark plug hole isn't good enough. Put a cork in the plug hole and turn the engine over until the cork pops out. Check the timing mark on the pulley is at 0' and that the rotor arm is pointing at the notch on the dizzie's rim. (its only a tiny mark, check you've not mixed it up with any other marks or nicks in the rim). That should be close enough for the engine to run.

The fact you're getting a spark makes me think the dizzie is 180' out and the engine is trying to fire on the exhaust stroke hence the black smoke.

PS I got the vac connections the wrong way around in my earlier post.

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 28 Jan 2011, 09:24
by thmpptrck
SCHOOL BOY ERROR

Spent 5 mins last night swapping the wires about and she roars to life!

Toninght i will put it all back together and time it up jobs a gudun...

Thanks for all your help guys...


Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 28 Jan 2011, 13:48
by BOXY
Glad you got it running. I had a go at mine again this morning but ran into a few problems. I tried bigherb's suggestion of turning the dizzie by hand to check for a spark and got nothing. Hum! I had a spare ECU so I swapped that in and got a spark! That probably explains why the 009 got fitted in the first place because the ECU failed?

I stripped out the 009 and fitted all the electronic bits ready for "lift off". Once fitted it started first turn off the key but sounded a bit fluffy. Woo Hoo!

I strobed the timing to 6' ATDC with the idle stabiliser plugs linked together and had to adjust the idle up to get it to 850rpm on the tacho. The fluffyness disappeared, it sounded smooth and idled happily for a minute or two. I blipped the throttle to see how far the timing advanced at higher revs and found there was a problem. There was a really noticeable hesitation before the revs rose and even at 3000 RPM the timing didn't advance beyond 6-8 BTDC I was expecting 30-40' BTDC?

I guess the mechanical advance isn't working at all and only the vac mechanism is altering the timing? I've got a dizzie off a DF engined van somewhere, is there any reason why I can't fit this on a CU engine?

In the meantime the 009 is back on

Re: CU Distributor wires???? Help please..

Posted: 15 Feb 2011, 12:51
by thmpptrck
Sorry been away a while..

Have a similar problem, if i set the timing to 8deg its runs but has no rev range drives awful will not pull! if i move it round to about 20deg it goes a lot better!and will pull but has flat spots all over...

Any ideas?