You shouldn't have needed to touch the distributor, all you did was replace the head gasket... didn't stuff up the valve clearances did you?

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did I tell you that I won a trophy?

Like I said, the mobile mechanic messed around with it when he tried to get it going.

I reset it back where it was before and it won’t start. I’ve tried a couple of times moving it around and it doesn’t work.

I did check all the valve clearances, I can double check them later. The ignition timing just seems wrong when I try and start it. I bypassed the black box as that caused me issues last year and I might have hooked it up wrong. Regardless it doesn’t look to be firing on 2 cylinders

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Dissy 180 degrees out? Ignition leads breaking down to earth?

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"Show me the Mini!"

Could also be your dissy cap there, timmy if the rotor arm is not making continuity with those cylinders. Would make sense if those cylinders were 180 degrees apart on the dissy as if the dissy cap has been squashed or cracked.

If you're uncertain about the the ignition signal going down the ignition lead of certain cylinders, use your timing light on each cylinder to see if it is triggering to find out where the issue might be in the circuit.

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-----Better is the enemy of good-----
-1976 Yellow Devil Leyland Clubman-
-1970 Morris Mini Van - Work in progress-

So I’ve tried:
Checked valve clearances
Confirmed timing is correct - pointing at 1 at TDC when both valves are closed
Different coil
Different plug leads and cap
Complete distributor with cap and leads
Compression check again
I had a plug out of the engine and earthed to the block but the spark was very weak or non existent

Next step is getting a fresh set of spark plugs as they are black and fuely. Also have a points dissy to try

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check dwell degrees at coil neg from memory about 48-52

Oh... you haven't tried new plugs... that would have been then first thing I tried. Have you moved the plugs around to see if the failing spark follows the plug?

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did I tell you that I won a trophy?

I don’t have a meter to check dwell. Normally it’s set by the black box...

And yes, I did try new plugs . They were new a couple of days ago, but all the non-starting might have killed them?

So this morning I picked up a condenser and new set of plugs from the local parts shop. Once I figured out how to wire up points (first time for me on the mini) and put in the new plugs it literally fired first crank and runs really smooth. Of course rookie error changing two things at once, so at this stage I don’t know what the cure was

The base timing is 10 degrees and the mechanical advance is locked out, and it holds the base timing while I rev the engine. When I reconnected the black box to the points to control the timing it seemed to be retarding rather than advancing from what I could tell - not sure if it’s the combination of the points dwell and the black box but I’ve got to check on that further

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The strange symptom is the whistling type noise.
Get someone to crank it and you check if there is any sign of any exhaust gas is coming out - blocked muffler ??
You could also drop off the exhaust system and see if it starts.

Hi Dave, I put the whistling noise down to air passing between cylinders 3&4. It was not present with all the spark plugs taken out, but with the comp tester in #3 or 4 the noise came back

I got the mechanical advance working again (it was locked out for the black box and had also seized up) and the car runs and drives OK again. I’ve done a hot retorque on the head and also rechecked the valve clearances. Of course many things to sort, but at least I’m on the road again

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