long story long, I rebuilt my distributor and chipped a couple of teeth on the gear taking the gear off, i did this to replace the hall effect sensor. I bought a new dist gear from "auto zone", mistake, it only had one hole for the roll pin. I did not think much about it I put the gear on put the roll pin in as far as it would go and cut off the excess.

I put the dist back on the truck timed it. It ran good, I went to the coast fishing I came back. It did ping on the way back, so I advanced it a bit. That was last weekend, yesterday I went to go fishing got 4 miles down the road, and the motor acts like it is out of fuel.

I put 2 gallons on the tank, checked for spark and a hundred other things, it still did not start. Finally I got some ether and......nothing. So my neighbor asks about the timing. I move the dist like 45 degrees maybe 60, I pulled the dist rotated it put it back in, and it starts. It ran like crap but that was a improvement.

Could the roll pin in the gear have sheared? The gear was as tight as could be to get on. Or is there another way for the timing to change that much. Like the CMP sensor, I think it is called, going bad. The dist bolt was tight. I would like to know if there could be some other culprit before I drill out the roll pin check to see if it is sheared, then reassemble and drill hole a 1/8" all the way through.

I will also need to figure out how to time my truck with no starting reference. I guess get the #1 to TDC put the rotor to #1 at the hall sensor.

I am a bit out of my league here. Any ideas would be greatly helpful. The coil, wires, hall effect sensor, ICM, dist cap, rotor, fuel filter are all 2 weeks old, the plugs have 6000 miles on them (they looked good, a few deposits tho, so I wire brushed them and put them back in). I did the diagnostic checks on the ICM, coil, and a few other things, and all was perfect. I have great spark.

The truck is a 1990 f150 300 inline 4wd EFI with TFI ignition, and EEC-IV comp.

 

So I did another check and the roll pin is NOT sheared, I slid a sewing needle into the hole and it hit the other side of the gear....... So now what. What else provides timing info to the computer?

 

that is all that sends the timing signal to the coil You have a lot of other sensors that can make you think it is timing, but could be fuel mixture. It could be as simple as your temp sensor that the computer uses to adjust fuel ratio. Many times it is a different sensor that you see on the gages for eng. temp. I think there is an altitude compensating sensor that can cause problems. I would take it someplace and see if any codes are present. That might give you a start.

 

I would buy a new/rebuilt dist. Your dist gear could have turned since you say you didnt get the roll pin completely in and cut the remains off. NOT GOOD! and if you broke some of the teeth off that could cause the gear on the cam to wear and or break off and cause the timing to be out. Check it with a timing light.

 

I'm going to go check the codes now. Thanks

 

The dist gear is perfect and has not moved on the shaft. but I though I said something to that affect.

The codes I got are 67 67 1 96 96

67 is a clutch switch circuit failure

continues codes 96 are written in the Haynes like this
Fuel pump secondary circuit failure<em dash>battery to PCM

I don't know what that means, is the PCM not getting the power it needs to supply the secondary fuel pump? If so how would changing your timing make it fire?