In the garden, and RAIN!!! (2)
POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Monday, September 7, 2026 11:50
VIEWED: 338648
PAGE 57 of 834
Er, IIRC you don't just take off a distributor cap and put it back on again. It has to be rotated to the right spot so that it makes the spark plus spark at the right moment in the ignition cycle. That's the sum total of my knowledge about distributor caps, and maybe even that's wrong.
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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Out for my walk in a bit. Dry right now.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Er, IIRC you don't just take off a distributor cap and put it back on again. It has to be rotated to the right spot so that it makes the spark plus spark at the right moment in the ignition cycle. That's the sum total of my knowledge about distributor caps, and maybe even that's wrong.
It's pretty easy-peasy on this one, at least as far as timing is concerned. There's two bolts. One on top and one on bottom, a bit cockeyed. You can only put it back on right side up or upside down. I don't know what would happen if you put it in upside down, but I'm not going to try it and tell you.
Also, the rotor inside of it can only be put back in the exact position it was taken out.My car seems to be much different than a lot of other cars when it comes to the whole distributor thing, so it was really hard to research and I couldn't even find a video that really applied directly to my situation. As far as timing is concerned, I think the only way I'd have to worry about that is if I were to remove the entire distributor and replace it. I'm hoping that I won't need to find that one out.
Unfortunately, the "common knowledge" that my car is super easy to work on didn't apply here. My cap is on the side of the engine and extremely hard to get at instead of facing upward and easy to access. I did manage to put it back together. Twice, actually. After I still had a misfire I decided to take it apart and try one more time. No dice. Normally you'd have to take apart a LOT of stuff for proper access to this thing, but I was able to fabricate some tools to do it, and because I have a good sense of touch I was able to unscrew and screw back in the bolt underneath that you couldn't even see from any angle.
But after doing this and changing the spark plugs, yet again, it isn't misfiring nearly as badly as it was before, and even after a few miles of local driving the check engine light hasn't come back on yet. Bad for trying to diagnose a problem, but super improvement from having the flashing light of death a few days ago. It's still no good though, and I can't drive it much other than trying to get it to throw a code for more info.
The cap and rotor were OG original with "Made in Japan" inside. That means they were more than a quarter of a century old.
I'm sure the wires are the same story, so that's the next thing to do. None of the auto parts stores carry these things in their store, so since I had to order them and have them shipped anyhow, I looked online and found an NGK set for almost half the price I could have gotten it for locally. But I can't do them now until mid-week next week when they arrive. Changing those out will be a cinch. Probably won't take me more than 5 minutes.
I did see evidence that they're not in great shape. By the distributor cap end a few of the plugs are malformed. This doesn't look like damage due to it being improperly sealed either. It looks like they may have melted a bit from overheating (maybe from all those attempts at trying to get the car to start a few weeks back).
If changing the wires doesn't work though, we might have a serious issue on our hands.
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Growing up in a Republic was nice... Shame we couldn't keep it.
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Back from my walk on a almost Spring day. Fairly warm out. But I got all done for today.
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Just got back from local driving. Light is back on and flashing again. :(
I did pick up the dialectic grease I need for the new wires when they come in though. Got some grocery shopping done and pretty much maxed out the free after rebate stuff through the first week of next month.
There was more to be had, but really... you've got to draw the line somewhere. Some of this stuff I wouldn't even know who to give it to, and why buy stuff that you're not ever going to use and is going to end up going to Goodwill even if it is free?
I don't have the exact numbers in front of me, but it was something like $191 worth of stuff that will cost me less than $21 after taxes. It was really good this time. Spent something like 11% of what it all would have cost. And that's not even including the savings from the sale prices that some of them already had before rebate. The percentage will probably will end up being only in the single digits once I figure it all out.
Power bill should be coming soon. Looking for a good laugh when I see how little I used this month. Can't wait for the energy report to see how I stacked up against the neighbors.
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Growing up in a Republic was nice... Shame we couldn't keep it.
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Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Power bill should be coming soon. Looking for a good laugh when I see how little I used this month. Can't wait for the energy report to see how I stacked up against the neighbors.
Speak of the Devil...
Those sons of bitches raised the price on gas again this month here. Still cheaper than in Illinois, but after they got theirs dropped by 1/3rds in January, the nickel or so it ticked up here is bringing us pretty close.
I still win though...
My gas usage was down 43% from last year. And that includes the entire 7-day cold snap from Christmas Eve through New Years from the bomb cyclone.
87 THERMS MUFUKAS!!!!!!!
That's only 10 more therms used than the mild month we had before, with an extra 4 days on the billing cycle.
Electric usage was down 7% too.
Bill was still just short of $200 which is a sin, but still $35 cheaper than last year.
But that means I'm up on them $31 so far for the winter over last year.
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Growing up in a Republic was nice... Shame we couldn't keep it.
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I'm waiting for our January gas bill. SoCalGas says expect more than double from last January.
Quote:
"Not The Weather": What's Behind California's Skyrocketing Natural Gas Bills
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/not-weather-whats-behind-californi
as-skyrocketing-natural-gas-bills
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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Had a weird problem this AM: very low water flow at the kitchen sink. I thought maybe the valve was bungrd or the aerator was clogged, so I tried the laundry tub. There too! So I tried a hose bibb bc it's on a different shutoff. There too! So I checked the pressure gage at the demand water heater... hmm...20psi instead of the usual 60psi. So I looked for big gushing leaks up from the ground. Then I checked the water meter... no flow. No leak. So I thought maybe it was a bad meter but I texted a couple of neighbors. It wasn't just us. So I called the city water dept emergency phone #, and the first thing I heard was "**** Fire Department. Low water pressure?" "Yes" "It's affecting the whole city. The city is working on it".
Well! At least it's a problem I don't have to fix!!
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE someone poor - William Blake
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Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I'm waiting for our January gas bill. SoCalGas says expect more than double from last January.
You're armed with the knowledge.
You could choose not to pay them double.
I did the math, and my bill would have been no less than $320 this month had I used the same energy as last year. So not only didn't they make $85 more off of me this month, but they got $35 less than they got from me last year. I only used 87 therms even with that week-long cold snap from the bomb cyclone and last year this month with 1 day less in the billing cycle I had used 159 therms.
Thanks assholes. You just paid for my car battery.
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Growing up in a Republic was nice... Shame we couldn't keep it.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
Had a weird problem this AM: very low water flow at the kitchen sink. I thought maybe the valve was bungrd or the aerator was clogged, so I tried the laundry tub. There too! So I tried a hose bibb bc it's on a different shutoff. There too! So I checked the pressure gage at the demand water heater... hmm...20psi instead of the usual 60psi. So I looked for big gushing leaks up from the ground. Then I checked the water meter... no flow. No leak. So I thought maybe it was a bad meter but I texted a couple of neighbors. It wasn't just us. So I called the city water dept emergency phone #, and the first thing I heard was "**** Fire Department. Low water pressure?" "Yes" "It's affecting the whole city. The city is working on it".
Well! At least it's a problem I don't have to fix!!
Ohhhh... Sounds like something happened to you like when the pipes burst on our block last year.
If they haven't issued you one, you should have gotten a boil notice. Hopefully you haven't drank any of that water in the meantime. I drank out of my coffee thermos all day after that happened and I only had about 10% water pressure to fill it up. Coffee gets hot, but it doesn't boil.
I was sick for DAYS after that. Hallucinating even at night. I remember semi-lucid moments while I was in between sleeping where I was convinced that I had cancer and that somebody intentionally did it to poison my water.
I hope they fixed it for you and none of you get sick Sigs.
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Growing up in a Republic was nice... Shame we couldn't keep it.
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