Reply To: 1965 Merc 900 distributor install

[Rick Robbins]

Dave, I have the the dist cap off and am putting the dist to the idle stop. I then put the rotor as much counter clockwise until it stops. Then I turn the dist housing slowly counter clockwise; holding the rotor in place, until point set 1 opens. This should be where I set the stop screw. The only problem I’m having is that that only travel I have is about 1/4″ from the idle stop position on the drive housing before the points open. When I used this engine years ago I could turn the dist quite a bit to the limit stop. Now it moves only the 1/4″ for idle before the points open. I didn’t measure it, but there must be at least 1/2″ to go to hit the max stop. The max stop is set where I had it in years past and ran perfectly. I know I’m missing something, just don’t know what at this point. I’m waiting until my die shows up Monday to clean up the threads on my .235 timing gauge and see how that goes. Right now I’m using a dial indicator. Haven’t worked on this motor for about 20 years and never had problems setting these at that time and it ran fine. Pretty sure I’m missing something.
Rick