Almost starting now

[FordPrefect]

Here's my situation on my 77 (as I've mentioned in another thread or two):

I had a slight ticking noise and oil leak, so I changed timing belt (oil leak was a cambox gasket), set timing and idle by the book, car ran great for maybe a week. Then the ticking noise turned into a lawn-mower like sound and the car lacked power. Turned out the exhaust manifold was loose, so torquing that down quieted the car back down to normal, but power was still an issue.

When I was working through this, I changed the points, condensers, distributor cap, ignition coil, plugs and wires. Most of this work was due anyhow, and this seemed as good a time as any. Gaps and timing were set, but still had a power issue, the car really struggled.

Then one day it fired up and slowly died. Since then, it hasn't started. So I rebuilt the carb (no idea when that was done last) and changed the fuel filter. The battery is good, all the fuses (and inline fuses) are good, as far as I can tell, everything is good. Spark there, fuel there, but no dice.

After rebuilding the carb and getting the choke squared away, the car actually fires a cylinder or two on occasion, which seems to indicate improvement, but it isn't enough to start for some reason.

I've done pretty nearly all I can think of, but I'm having no luck.

[So Cal Mark]

unless a carb is flooding or completely empty, it won't keep a car from starting. Have you removed the plugs to see if they're wet?

[124JOE]

did you replace the belt it may have jumped time "due to a streched belt"
put it in 4th and roll the car untill its dtc look at the timing marks to conferm that it is correct or wrong

i was told to replace the belt evey time one is removed
but i go with"replace it if you dont know the age of it"

[FordPrefect]

unless a carb is flooding or completely empty, it won't keep a car from starting. Have you removed the plugs to see if they're wet?

I think they were wet last I checked, I'll double check today.

did you replace the belt it may have jumped time "due to a streched belt"
put it in 4th and roll the car untill its dtc look at the timing marks to conferm that it is correct or wrong

I did put on a new belt when I changed the cambox gasket, and I've double checked the marks a number of times. Would a single tooth off create a no start?

[FordPrefect]

Alright, plugs are wet and smell like gas. Each plug fires a spark when I ground them outside the engine on the hood latch.

[124JOE]

test your fuel persure (3 or 4 psi)

[dmwhiteoak]

Just for kicks, I would advance the timing a little. My car will not start with the timing set proper. Why? I dont know . Maybe the dizy is off a toothe . It would be worth a try. Someday I will get around to figuring it out but for now it runs GREAT.

[124JOE]

yes some people set the timing by ear and perfomance

[RRoller123]

On my old X1/9s I used to set the distributor advance with a vacuum gauge, with excellent results. Just advance to the highest stable vacuum and it ran like a charm. This ended up advancing the spark a little beyond printed spec, but the resulting performance was excellent.