@@aclive2022 use the matin industry’s timing chain tensioner you won’t regret that and also the timing on 96-97 is a different setup, no coil wire so the layout is different just do your research
Everything i have read says your supposed to time to 10degrees before TDC on the compression stroke. The little OEM sticker under the hood says this as well. On my 97 your distributer is point in the correct location but the crankshaft is not on the correct mark. Also if oil pump is not primed on install it will not actually pump oil
I have a 97 that needs a timing tensioner, so I have been looking into this myself. The FSW manual from Nissan ( If you don't have, let me know) shows that the rod coming out of the oil pump and the distributor drive spindle shaft, should be installed by aligning punch mark on the distributor driving spindle, with oil hole on oil pump shaft. I get that you have to change the timing position by relocating the oil shaft a tooth to change the timing. Just wanted to make sure the oil hole on the oil pump and distributor driving spindle mark are aligned. If they are not, it doesn't seem you would be able to get the timing right. Manual shows the rotor button pointing straight up on page 89 in the Engine Mechanical Section. Best I can tell, center of rotor button should be pointing at the most forward point of that triangular shaped piece on the distributor at 2:32. It looks close there. Since you had an overheat, I'm just thinking over the possible assemble pitfalls. For sure, off timing or flipping a head gasket and blocking a water jacket (I've done it) or stuck thermostats are all overheat points.There is a bolt beside the water temp sensor that you remove to bleed out the air. This guy shows it, ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-Y2h7n8IQ2RU.html. Probably just the timing, but all things that came to my pea brain. Mine was idling rough and turned out to be clogged EGR system. I'll be deleting that shortly. Headache with vacuum lines, like you said, but I want it gone. But I digress, lol, because you probably already fixed it. What did you find?
So from what I can gather it’s easier to remove the distributor cap and make sure the rotor is pointing at spark plug number becuz in the Haynes manual it doesn’t show the newer distributor that doesn’t have the middle wire to the coil, so my timing was of and was basically the cause of the overheating also due to me having a electric fan setup that I kept forgetting to turn on, but the rest of the info about the timing in the manual is correct
Hey what are the aluminum sticks you're talking about? I'm getting ready to do this myself. Thanks for all the videos hope the rebuild is going smoothly!
