911SC distributor question - pleas dont move

[ramonesfreak]

ok bub. Thanks you are so helpful


BTW I dont have a good shop within 300 miles of me. NOBODY here knows these cars. There is one shop here that everyone will say is THE shop to go to. Having left my car there for the last 2 months and seeing the results tells me they do not.

Im not in LA like you...or somewhere in california

I also figured out the problem immediately and just needed 1 simple question answered, which was answered

Not all of us have a way to create a vacuum on the spot.

AS I said, I didnt create the problem. The problem was created by the prior owner and there was no way or reason for me to be aware of it until now as the car ran fine for almost 20 years ive had it.

You might not mean to insult me - you didnt - but rather just confirmed your an arrogant dick with a bad attitude. If that sentence confuses, well, ask around

"I don't say this to insult you, people's talents lie in many different areas. Yours do not lie in mechanical things."

Huh? Go eff yourself dude. Your an A hole and have absolutely no clue about my talents regarding "mechanical things"

Adios

Originally Posted by speeder

Find a good shop that knows air-cooled 911s, you're not qualified to be working on your car. I don't say this to insult you, people's talents lie in many different areas. Yours do not lie in mechanical things.

Wayne started this website in order to encourage everyone to work on their own Porsches so that he could sell more parts directly to customers but the results have been untold numbers of butchered and ruined cars in the 20+ years I've been here. Determining which diaphragm in a vacuum unit move the distributor in which direction is about as complicated as a steak knife. You simply remove the distributor cap and apply vacuum to each nipple and see which way it moves the plate in relation to the direction that the rotor turns. If any of the last sentence confuses you, move away from the car and take it somewhere. Driving around with vacuum advance/retard hoses on backwards could have a very negative effect on timing and cause overheating, among other things. Ignition timing on any engine is important, on an air-cooled engine, it can be life or death.

[john70t]

We are only here to help (some more diplomatic than others). Speeder gave good advice and it was taken personally and responded to in the wrong way. Wow. That'll teach anyone trying to help. You got it all figured out big man. Maybe next time he won't say anything at all.

Right now it 'feels' like it's running better but overheats or knocks in the future as mentioned. Then what..
Suggest you research further and get advice from the tech side.

Get it right my friend, and then go out and enjoy the experience.

[ramonesfreak]

He did not give good advice and he knows nothing about my "talent with mechanical things".

If he knew me, which he wont and dont, he would know I am actually quite good with mechanical things. He assumed I was not. He is rude and arrogant.

He loves to go around picking people's posts apart and and pointing out why he thinks the person is wrong, or an idiot or whatever. I've been here a long time...im not blind. Go look at his other post from a few minutes ago on the Robbie Robertson thread going out of his way to criticize someone's use of the word "starstruck"

Give me a break John

My car doesn't knock and has never come close to overheating and if does, ill deal with it using my talents and looking for assistance if need be

His intention was not to help. If you cant figure that out, then oh well

As I said multiple times above, I am all set. The problem is fixed. So why did he take the time to write such a long post accusing me of having no mechanical talent? Figure it out

Have I ever spent more than 30 seconds learning how a distributor works? No. Not until yesterday, ill admit that but I can guarantee that when I am done with it, I will be an expert in distributors and on to the next mechanical problem that life throws at me daily

Have a nice day :-)

[speeder]

No good deed goes unpunished with some people. The guy is an absolute idiot on something as simple as a vacuum advance unit on a distributor, thinks that he should be working on his own Porsche and lashes out at someone knowledgeable trying to help.

Fk the OP but for anyone else reading this who might be miles from a decent shop, the internet and some simple tools available online will solve a lot of questions. Everyone should have a simple vacuum pump if working on anything that uses vacuum to control engine functions. You don't need a Snap-on pump, (though they are great), any Chinese one from Amazon works fine. They are cheap.

There is no way to determine whether a vacuum unit of any kind is functioning without applying vacuum to it. Unless you can suck a golf ball through a garden hose, you need a pump to test them. Diaphragms go bad in the 40 years since 911SCs were made. You also have no idea whether a two-hose diaphragm is all retard or advance without the pump...sometimes both hoses are advance but work in stages. I'm speaking generically of vacuum units, not specifically Porsche. Hundreds of distributors used vacuum units over the decades.

Making sure that an old distributor is working correctly and the movements or plates are moving freely is essential to proper ignition timing and keeping engine temps where they need to be. If this stuff is over your head, bring it to someone.

[ramonesfreak]

lashes out? yea ok.

because i am not a distributor expert yet I shouldn't be working on my porsche?

Seahawk, if you see this please delete this thread. Thankyou

[pmax]

[speeder]

“Please don’t move,” then “please delete.” This guy is a fking riot.

[908/930]

On a different note, I have seen these vac lines swapped backwards before, not sure if it is in a book somewhere illustrated wrong. I was told by somebody who is well respected on this form that it does not matter but I totally disagree we were discussing a 930 ignition, I didn't bother to get into it with him. The more you learn about your own car the better off you will be, when I can't service it I will sell it.

[Bill Douglas]

While we are all having a happy debate about vacuum lines I thought I'd ad my handy helpful hint.

A few times I've suspected something vac' line related, so I've snipped about 10mm off the ends of (some of) the lines and reconnected them. And the problem has gone away Problem is they bounce around, vibrations etc, and stretch at the ends. 10mm snipped off they still have enough length but a nice tight connection.

[speeder]

Yep, the ends get to be like an old wizard’s sleeve.

[Superman]

A search would be for Early_S_Man

Legend, yes.

Originally Posted by speeder

Find a good shop that knows air-cooled 911s...

Mr. Walker could likely tune this engine in ten minutes, if he kept his eyes closed. But it can be done by many of us. Except that mixture should really be set with a sniffer in the exhaust pipe. And fuel pressures are important, which requires another gadget. But ignition timing and advance can totally be done with a good timing light. My '78 SC has an '83 motor in it, and this motor does well at about seven degrees of advance beyond factory spec. Some of these engines can do that, and others can't. Many mechanics like to advance timing until the engine starts to knock/ping, and then back the timing off a couple of degrees. The pinging will be most apparent in fifth gear at 2000 rpm or so. Pretty easy to hear. Pinging is really bad. Pinging will not happen at factory ignition timing spec unless something is really wrong. But as I say, some of these engines will also not ping when timing is a bit advanced, and they will perform better there.

At any rate, congratulations on finding and fixing this problem.