I recently acquired a 78 F150 cheaply. It has a short bed, and a 400* in it.
When I got it, it ran decently - it sounded relatively smooth at idle, roared smoothly into the higher RPM ranges etc.
The owner told me he'd gotten it as a repo, and the previous owner(2nd owner ago) couldn't get it started -- it turned out to be 180 degrees off timing wise.

After getting it home and playing with it a bit, it sounded a bit rough at idle(my dad said it was only firing on 7 cyls, but I didn't think it was that bad because I'm used to a 7.3 IDI, which all seem to sound like that); higher RPMs were still smooth.
Oh, and for some reason, if I put too much torque on the engine, say going up a hill, it would just... lose power, sputter and die. let off on the throttle entirely and it might barely keep running. I thought it was fuel, etc, and last weekend decided to see if I could fix it, so I looked at the carb and didn't see anything obviously wrong(but I'm no expert).
I figured perhaps the sparkplugs were fouled; pulled them all out and found they were, and got a new set.
Now, when I did this, I neglected to label which wire went where. They were in nice bundles, and I figured it'd be easy to tell which went back where.
Well, I get the new plugs home, put them in, wire it back up... I try to start it and only get cranking, and one or two backfires. Obviously, I did something wrong.
I ripped all the wires out, found a diagram online and put them in back in accordance with the diagram. Checked it several times, with no popping /at all/. Checked for spark, found good spark at #1 cyl(and #2, as far as I tested).
I've rechecked the wires several times, without luck.

Now, while trying to figure all of this out, I found out that the distributor wasn't bolted in. The only thing keeping it from turning was a thick layer of grease. This could easily account for my problems -- perhaps *all* of them.
I tried cranking and manually rotating the distributor, hoping at one point it'd catch, but it never did.

At this point... I need to figure out a couple of things:
1. How can I tell if the distributor gear is in correctly? If it's a gear, couldn't it go in multiple (incorrect) ways?
2. How do I rotate the distributor to get things running? Once it's running, I can easily use my timing light to adjust things, I think, but until then, is there some sort of rule/mark I can use to get things "close"? (again, used to the 7.3 idi where you just line up the IP marks and it'll run).
3. This is a diagram, with identical wiring to the one I used to wire up the distributor cap. Is it right? http://t1.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:A...fz2vkvsp1hTAPH

Note that I'm kinda new to gas engines, in that while I've seen and heard about all these things, I haven't worked on/seen one worked on in years... my family's been driving diesels for the last ten years.


*note: I'm not positive it's a 400. I was told it's a 400, the body sticker's been painted over, and I know it's either a 351 or 400, because it's got fuel pump bolts top and bottom, not side to side as in the Windsor. Either way, everything should be the same between the two engines, at least as far as what I'm doing.

 

first pull the wires and distributor off completely and start over from scratch. sounds like if they had it 180degrees out they swapped the plug wires to compensate, you put them back where they belong and now it doesnt run. start over. I drop my dizzy at 10 degrees btdc on my 400 and tune from there.

 

pull the dist. completely out. pull #1 plug. mark side of dist where #1 plug wire goes.
pull coil wire from coil. have someone crank engine while you put a finger into #1 spark plug hole. each time the compression stroke come up it will blow your finger out of hole. do this in short cranks until you think you have the piston TDC. Check the timing mark on damper to see if it's close. if not move damper till it's on tdc. turn the rotor in the dist so it's pointing to the #1 wire location you marked on the side. drop dist down hole making sure rotor points to #1. if it turns past pull it back out, rotate counterclockwise one tooth drop down again. do this until rotor points to #1. Don't worry if dist doesn't fall all the way down to the seat. when you have the rotor pointing to #1 hold side of dist, pushing down slightly and crank engine. dist should now go down against block. have someone crank engine again with your finger at hole and each time the compression blows past your finger the rotor should be pointing at the mark on the side of dist marked as #1. your n ow in time. put your plug wires on accordingly #1 wire at mark firing order for the 400 13726548
don't forget to put the bolt in and tighten after timing

 

This is the most useful information I have seen so far. Like I said, I don't know exactly how to do all this, but step by step instructions like these I think I can follow.

We'll find out Saturday.

 

If you have a hard time getting your thumb stuck over the hole try an oldtimer's trick.
Knock the porcelain off an old sparkplug and drill a hole thru the centre. Then all you need to listen for is the whistle.

 

RWENUTS, Well I'm 76 and this was the way my dad taught me and then he'd hold onto the end of the plug wire and have me crank the engine to make sure the coil was good.
Of course we only had 6 volt systems back then. I don't think he'd like holding onto my
system I'm using today.

 

Well, good news! I did as you guys suggested, and got it running again. Now, part of my problem was timing, and part was that some of the wire-boots on the ends weren't right - the spark plug ends were fine, as I'd checked them before, but some of the distributor ones were not contacting the distributor plug. So, with only 3-4 cyls able to fire at all... no wonder it wouldn't work!

Now, two questions(for next week):
1. dynamic timing.
I've got a snap-on MT2261(or something very similar in form; mine is from like 1991), and it's got the advance adjustment.
I made a mark with chalk at about the 10degATDC mark, and roughly lined up the distributor to cyl1 when that was alined with the timing arrow.
After getting the engine idiling, I rotated the distributor while listening to the engine. As I advaned it(rotated the body clockwise), it ran faster and faster, and then at a certain point it sounded like it was missing. I backed it off a little and locked it down.
I then hooked up my timing light to cyl1, and adjusted the advance on it until the chalk mark lined up with the timing arrow. My light said 44deg.
Now, this is quite odd. What's the deal here? Anything else I can check, or anything to be aware of with these meters?

2. The distributor cap is held on by two metal clasps to this black plastic "adapter" piece which is then held to the distributor. Both pieces appear to be in good shape, and the clasps are tight. But, with the engine running, the cap seems to nutate/wobble around in time with the rotor. Is this normal? It doesn't seem to be doing any harm, but looks odd.

 

take the dist cap off, run your finger around the inside of the dist and you should feel a little tang sticking out. now look at the inside of the cap and you'll see a groove there.
that groove has to slip over that tank. that'll lock the cap in place. I think you have it on 180°. look and see

 

Nope, it's on right. I already checked that, it's seated properly.
Note that this motion isn't huge, perhaps .03 up or down, but it's still some.