I recently purchased a 1963 f100 with a 390 from a Merc Monterey. It has a tick and when I was driving home after it would warm up it would loose power.

Today I found the firing order to be way off. I have the oil pump out right now so I cant change it and start it up. But, my question is would that cause the symptoms I described? I could let it cool down for awhile then be back on the road for 5 min or so before it began again.

Would I have done any perm damage driving it like this? the fring order was way off. like 6-1-2-x-x-x afer I saw the first three I knew there was a problem.

The tick seems to be comming from the area of the engine where the distributor is on the driver's side.

Any thoughts or opinions would be appreciated!

 

WAG: If the timing has jumped, someone may have advanced the firing order to compensate.

Can you see and check the timing chain with the pan off?

As for the tick, it's usually a lifter. If that engine has never been gone through, it could be anything....

 

even with jumped timing the firing order would still be the same wouldnt it? The correct oder is 15426378 but 1 and 2 are next to each other.

 

Correct, wasn't really analyzing your first post for that, hence the "WAG" notice.

 

I had a tick like that before I went through my engine, it was a slight leak in the exhaust manifold.. The tick can also be a plug wire arcing. If the firing order was incorrect, and it was not back firing or running pretty rough then you might be having an issue with a dead cylinder. You might want to run a compression test, and a leak down test too. Also what kind of condition is your dizzy in. and is it still breaker points, or have you converted to breakerless ie; Pertronix or MSD or the like? It seems like there might be a few things going on , and probably not one particular thing... Start with the cheap and simple things and rule things out one at a time.. give it a full tune up, with new wires, plugs and rotor and cap for the dizzy, new fuel filter and air filter... pull the valve covers and inspect the rockers , and the rocker shaft to see if it is bent.. sometimes the ends of the rocker shafts bend upward with age or abuse and can cause end (1,4,5,8) valves to have excessive lash, which will cause a ticking. Your loss of power could be the sign of a hot spot, or overheating issues... But as I stated start simple and go from there. Keep us updated!