Have you solved the problem?
Have you solved the problem?
It sure sounds like a timing chain slipped.
I ran into this a few times when I was in high school working as a mechanic to make money.
The first time I saw it was on a fairly new Chevy Vega. No body could get it to start.
Then one guy says hey, lets make sure the timing belt didn't slip.
Boom. Put on a new one in the proper position and no more problems.
Got a new ignition kit and fresh points and condenser. Still doesn't start. 
Guess it's time to pull the front cover and check cam timing.
In reply to TR7:
Before you do that, set the crank at TDC and then pull the valve cover to see if the #1 valves are both closed.
Ian F wrote: In reply to TR7: Before you do that, set the crank at TDC and then pull the valve cover to see if the #1 valves are both closed.
This. Stop throwing parts at it and guessing. It's a waste of time and money. Start from the beginning, and that's timing. Make sure that's correct, then go to spark, then go to fuel. Any other order at this point is useless.
Jack up the radiator cap and drive a new car under it.
Then replace the radiator cap......
Valves are closed at TDC, 0 degrees on the cover/crank mark. Could timing have jumped enough to mess up firing, but still be OK when looking at the valves? Key have slipped on the crank?
When you hear hooves, think horses, not camels.
In other words, don't jump to the odd scenario immediately. Instead of jumping to a slipped crank key, go step by step, methodically.
Sounds like timing is correct, with both closed at tdc. Next go to distributor cap and see where the rotor is pointing, write that down as #1, so you don't get 180 off.
With the cap off, crank it, do the points spark? If so, put the rotor and cap on. Put the #1 wire on, crank, look for spark at the end. Does it spark?
Lets get spark out of the way first. Report back when you have all 4 plugs firing, at the plugs.
I'm not trying to come off as condescending, with old cars, it's the simple stuff 90% of the time.
New plugs fouled during failed starts before new ignition kit? Lots of cranking on wet plugs...
If the plugs are wet, the engine is flooded. Is the choke still closed? I would remove the plugs and allow the cylinders to dry out. You could disable ignition to prevent fire and crank the engine with towel over plug holes to prevent raw gas from spraying all over.
In reply to MDJeepGuy:
Much truth spoken here.I was pulling my hair out over a failed rotor cap, brand new out of the box, fun time that was.
Got it! There were two intermittent problems it seems. The distributor was not always grounding. Hitting the bottom of the points and the base plate with some emery cloth solved that. The hot to the coil would also short out, but only sometimes. (why didn't the fuse blow? I have no idea..). When cranking the motor this didn't seem to be a problem, but once a cylinder fired there was enough vibration to cause one of these problems to show up. Hence why I got one good pop, then nothing. Cranking with the plugs out didn't seem to rattle the wiring enough to cause an issue so it looked like spark was fine while I was checking.
Excellent! Thanks for the followup.
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