Hello all. I've got a 94 F150 4x4 that now won't start. If you don't know already, please see the post "94 Inline 6 exhaust" that I posted a few days ago.

In doing a tune up (plugs, wires, distributor cap, rotor), i found that the Distributor was loose enough to turn approximately 90 degrees. I borrowed a timing light and the wrench to time it, and 3 Shade-Tree Mechanics and a Lube technician couldn't find the timing mark.
This truck is originally from Minnesota, so rust abounds in the engine compartment. Important tags, timing marks, harmonic balancer, and just about anything else I might need to read is covered in rust or has rusted off something important.
Before the tune-up, the truck ran great. After the tune-up, I seemed to loose all my power and couldn't pull a hill in anything but first gear; that normally could be taken in Overdrive. Then i found out my cats melted the rest of the exhaust and left me broke down on the side of the road.

I've never had a tune-up make a vehicle go from good to bad or worse. I still haven't been able to time the vehicle. I can't get it to run now, as I've put all the plugs on the dist. cap in original factory order (2 were out of place before and directly after tune up) and cannot remember what order they started in [when it ran]. Also, just today, I had to replace the coil as it wasn't throwing any spark yesterday.
Now I have spark, and I have fuel. I just have no running truck!

Please somebody tell me you've had this problem before and you know exactly what it is!

 

This is what I would do.
Remove the dist cap, have someone crank the starter while you watch which direction the rotor in the dist turns, clockwise or counterclockwise.
Remove the #1 spark plug and have someone or you crank the engine(with the cap off) until you can feel the pressure of the #1 piston coming up to the top of the compression stroke. Stop there and move the belt and puleys in the same direction of engine rotation until the #1 piston is at the top-- you can use a piece of coat hanger to come close to the piston coming to the top. The timing mark on the crank pulley should be very close to the pointer . Clean the rust off the pulley and use some penetrating oil to help see the mark. You can rotate the engine by hand a little in ether direction at this point to get the mark "0"or TDC lined up with the pointer.
Once this is done, take the wire from the coil that goes to the center of the dist cap and place it about 3/16 from a good ground on the engine.
Now with the key in the on position rotate the dist some in the same direction as the rotor turned then move it back against the normal direction of rotation . You should see the spark jump from the coil wire to ground , stop there and lock the dist in that spot.
Now if you place the dist cap on the dist where the rotor is pointing is the location of where the # 1 spark plug wire goes. The firing order is 1 5 3 6 2 4 in the direction you saw the rotor going earlier. If the rotor normally turned clockwise for example, the next wire on the cap should be #5 and so on. The plug wires should go in the normal direction of rotor rotation and at least the engine should start and run. Let us know when you get this far ,the rest is a piece of cake.

 

Hanky, you are pure mechanical genius. I've never heard of that "turn the distributor and you should see a spark" trick. The hardest thing about this fix was finding that blasted timing mark. Once we found it, everything else fell into place.
Thank you so much! I'm very glad to have found (and joined!!) this forum!!
Now all I gotta do is fix the exhaust...

 

Of course you know my hat will not fit for a while since my head swelled to unbelievable proportions. Glad I was able to help.