SC distributor...a little help....

[konish]

Okay, after getting some wise words about distributor preventative maintenance I pulled my distributor. I removed the philips head screw from the center of the shaft under the rotor and felt plug. However, I can't get the inductive pick-up points (star shaped item on the rotor) to pull away from the body of the distributor...it'll only come up about 1/2". Anyway, I did see three philips head screws around the permieter of the distributor, accesible through holes in the advance mechanism. Do these need to come out before the whole mechanism can lift out of the ody of the dist? Of course, the heads have been all but stripped, so I'm going to Sears and buy a set of their Craftsman screw out bits and see if they work...if not looks like ez outs. Anybody ever use the screw-outs they advertise (like ez outs but no drilling required)?

Finally, the shaft seemed pretty stiff when being rotated and I squirted some lube around the perimeter to see if it would help loosen things up. Well, it spins MUCH easier now, but if I spin it too fast it'll bind a bit and squeal. If I set the shaft height just right I can spin it with no noise at all, but any amount higher or lower than that sweet spot and I get the squeal and a noticeable amount of binding. I hope what I wrote makes sense...almost like a bad bearing...when spun too fast it resonates (squeals) as the surfaces start to contact and bind. Any thoughts or can anyone post a diagram? I saw one posted a long time ago by early_s_man, but the parts and configuration are different enough that it does not seem to apply. Thanks ini advance

R/
Dustin

[konish]

Hmmmm...come to think of it. In the mornings, I have heard a suealing from the engine bay and assumed it was the fan belt. However, the squeal from my dist sounds very much like what I had thought was the belt. The other symptom I get when I hear the squeal, is a lower idle and the engine would load up (perhaps the lower idle speed was due to the dist. shaft binding?). Can't say if it is the dist or the belt, but it makes me wonder.

R/
Dustin