I have the cap off of course, and the blue plastic housing, but what do I do from there?

I'm trying to get to the advance weights to switch in some new springs.

Thanks, AleX

 

For V8? Complete disassembly of Dura-spark Distributor. V8
Take off the rotor, then using a small gear puller or two screwdrivers, pry off the armature, remove the roll pin, remove the wire plate retainer from the groove, remove the ground screw holding the ground strap and lower plate to the base, holding the wires on the outside of the base pull up to slide the wiring grommet from it's slot, remove the C washer that secures the vacuum advance rod to the stator assembly, lift the vacuum advance rod off the post on the stator and rotate the top plate to position the post out from under the pull rod. You should have a pile of parts now.

 

A lot of times the vacuum advance screws will break off in the housing, once that happens your in trouble. There are no advance weights available, nor the plastic piece that holds them on & you will break them if you try to remove the weights.

 

Seventyseven, thanks very much! That's a more detailed set of instructions than I was even hoping for. I just didn't want to go yanking on the rotor and gear and break them if they weren't just supposed to pull off.

And Mark, ya I knew I was going to have trouble when I saw steel screws into cast aluminum, and mine's pretty corroded too. That's part of the reason I asked for help getting it apart, if there was any way to do it without taking out some of those screws that would have been great. It's essentially worthless to me right now though, and I can just go grab another at the junkyard for next to nothing I'd assume if I need one, so oh well.

I'm trying to rehab it to build a sort of scrap motor for my truck, one last shot at a 400. I have a hopefully still nice shortblock with flat top pistons, and some clean crack free stock heads, and enough valves, springs, cams and intakes to throw something together for the price of gaskets, so I'm going to see what I can do in a few days.

I had high hopes, and some high dollars, into my last attempt, this 400 shortblock, with some closed chamber 4V heads, and a really cool setup with an air gap intake and a full roller deal, but it ended up being so much on the razor edge, that something failed, I'm gunna see what it was today....

This "new" motor should hav a static CR of right around 9.1 (with stock open heads though) as opposed to 10.3 in the 4V motor, but this distributor is a pingerator how it's set up right now, and it's currently the weakest link I think, so we'll see what I can do.

Anyway though, thanks for the info guys, and I might just be able to pull a little diamond out of all this rough finally! All I really want is a sick old truck with a little extra power, that actually goes. I'm done being greedy for now.

AleX

 

Good luck, and remember to be careful in there. A little penetrating fluid goes a long way. If you need help with re-assembly or anything feel free to ask.

 

Hooooly granola, I don't think those things were ever made to be serviced. For something the size of a softball, that sure was a royal little b!tch. I had to drill and EZ out all 4 screws, all 4 heads broke off doing that, then I tried to grab onto the bottoms of the shafts on the vacuum thing and twist them out that way, and both shafts broke off..... I also cracked the base housing, and ruined the mount holes on the vac., and all 4 screws are still stuck in partially!

Why does aluminum bond to steel so stupidly with time?

Anyway, I see the springs, but I don't know what I'm going to do from here with the whole thing in such sad shape. Yikes, I thought changing springs was an easy routine thing.

 

Holy granola is right! Do you have access to another unit? this obviously isn't your DD.

 

Well actually if you can believe it this technically is my daily driver. I've driven it only a few months out of the two years I've owned it, but it's the only car I have registered and insured right now. I'm a college student, and luckily I have a generous family and we make it work and all share the cars, but that's not what I want! haha

And well, I don't have another unit myself, I can grab one from the junkyard pretty easily whenever, but I doubt I'd have any more luck getting that one apart than this one, so what I'm likely going to do is go to the parts store, drop 40 bucks for a remanufactured stock one, and then disassemble that, and switch in some stiffer springs. I'm assuming that the fastners in that one will have been recently replaced obviously....

 

Yah, it just ain't the same driving mom's minivan around. HAHA. That's probably a good idea, that will save you from looking for a used unit, and you'll spend about the same anyways..