Alright so I also bought some pretty heavy duty cable from the local stereo shop (which might be overkill, but hey) and I went ahead and crimped, then soldered, then heat shrinked these connections. I have the positive lead running along the passenger frame rail to the starter, then I have the ground going to frame, a solid ground from block to frame, then another one from block to body. It wounds like people recommend one from frame to body as well?? But I felt as if it was all grounded sufficiently, so somebody let me know if I should really add that final one.
Months and months ago, after getting the engine all totally together I remember spending a thorough amount of time trying to not mess up and get my initial timing setup pretty decently, so once I double checked everything I could, I got my fire extinguisher ready, and had a friend on standby with me I went ahead and hit the key to the ignition on.. No explosion so far... so once I double checked a couple things and verified that I was getting fuel and spark we went ahead and tried to crank it
Now you can tell when an engine is trying to fire up, and this thing absolutely, positively sounded nothing like that. It would just crank, and backfire, and crank... Nowhere even close. I double checked a couple things and I knew about the possibility of having the distributor in 180 degrees off, so after cranking a couple times I just wanted to verify that first. I got the #1 piston to TDC then I peaked under the distributor cap and confirmed that it was pointed toward the #1 cylinder. It was.
So I put it back together, crank it a few times and of course I get the exact same. So this time I decide I'm going to pull the cap completely and go all through the initial timing set up routine again and see what the hell's going on. I pull the valve cover and confirm the #1 cylinder at TDC again, then I pull the wires off the cap and pull it off and VOILA, it was pointed at exactly 180 degrees the wrong way!
Turns out I just so happened to set it 180 degrees off in the very beginning, then when after cranking it several times and checking it again, it just so happened to still appear to be correct. Now by this third time it finally appeared to be 180 degrees off, so I pulled it, rotated it and hooked it all back up.
This time when I cranked it immediately you could tell the difference. Right away you could hear that it was chugging and trying to fire up, and from then on I was all settled and felt like I had it under control. For a minute there I was starting to get nervous and feeling so incompetent because it seemed nowhere close to running and I did't know what to do because everything seemed right... but sure enough after a few cranks and pumping the pedal a few times it was up and running like a champ. I adjusted the idle screw a little and messed with the timing light a little and it seems to be running really clean and the engine sounds super crisp.
feeling like a boss ass mastermind truck builder
Immediately after that I shut it down and proceeded to get a beat down by the braking system for the next 4 days...
but thats a story for another time lol
