@%^#&@!

Man, what a mind bender! In trying to determine the firing order on my pickup, I've found conflicting advice as to what cylinders correspond with the wires. In one post, it said that the number ONE cylinder is the one nearest the front when you're standing in front of the truck scratching your head with the hood up, and number TWO is on the RIGHT closest to the front, THREE is the next one back from ONE on the left side again, and they ping-pong back, ending with EIGHT at the back on the right side.

The other one I read is that the cylinder bank on the left, again staring at the engine from the front of the car, is numbered 1,2,3,4 (one at the front), and the bank on the right is 5,6,7,8 with 5 at the front.

SO! Can someone please explain once and for all:

1: When someone says "right side" with no other description, are they talking about the driver side or the passenger side? What's the standard of communication on this one?

2: What IS the darn firing order on my all-stock, original 1965 Ford F-250 Camper Special with its tired, old 352?

3: What direction does the rotor turn? Counter Clockwise?

4: What are the correct plugs? The guy at Schuck's gave me Autolite AP 45 plugs and the suggested gap was around .035 inches. Is this right? How hard shall I torque them down?

5: Bonus Question: What's the best way to determine which contact on the dist. cap corresponds to number one?

I'm a Volvo enthusiast and I probably need to unlearn a lot of Euro-Crap before I work too much on this truck. There seems to be very little information on this model and I'm beginning to think it's either very rare, or nobody ever has problems with them. (Ha!)

Thanks in advance

Broken Down And Weeping

 

Okay, So I determined the firing order and the cylinder designation by (*gasp*) simply looking at the manifolds for the number designations and at the rear of the head for the firing order.

That wasn't too hard.

I'm still in the dark as to which contact on the distributor corresponds with cylinder #1. Is there an easy way to do this? Is there a hard way to do this?

Thanks!

Ben in Seattle

 

Hello Ben,
Usually it is not too particular, just look at the rotor when #1 cyl is at TDC on the compression stroke, note which contact it is on, then run that cable to #1 cyl, then follow your firing order in accordance with the direction of rotation of dist when connecting your other 7 plugs.

 

Do I need to turn the engine over with the spark plug out on #1 until I feel the piston come up? If so (and I hope there's an easier way), how do I know if it's on the compression stroke or not?

Thanks,

Ben

 

Ben,

Yes, one way is to pull #1 plug, [also pull coil wire so it wont fire], use a remote starter switch, [be sure it is in nutrual or park], hold your thumb in plug hole and crank until it just blows pressure, then use a wrench on crankshaft pulley and roll it just to the TDC mark.
One other way is to pull the valve cover and turn the crankshaft and watch until the intake valve starts to move, keep turning the crank until the intake valve is fully closed, then continue until you reach the TDC mark. you are now on top of the compression stroke.

 

Guys, shouldn't the rotor be looking at the pasenger side headlight when set on #1.

just a little point of referrence.

John

 

jowiler,

provided to distributor was put in correctly

 

Most of the better quality distributor caps, Standard, Motorcraft, Neihoff, etc., have the number one terminal identified with the numeral "1". This numeral is located on the top of the cap, between the coil and spark plug terminals. On a distributor that is still in the factory position this terminal is to the driver's side of the rear holddown clip. In other words, if you are looking down on the distributor while standing in front of the truck, number one terminal is at the one o'clock position. As stated in earlier posts, a good manual, Motors, Haynes, Chilton, etc., will show this. If the distributor has been installed in other than the factory position you will need to follow the steps outlined in previous posts to confirm where #1 needs to go in the distributor.
Hope this helps.
Roger Carter