hello everyone i have a 1994 accord 4 door ex 5spd.. i have a bad timing problem, the car does not like to idle correctly. it either idles high,low surges or stalls, it has always pinged on acceleration since i got it..when i bought it i was told it had a new timing belt...i belived the problems with the car were due to a bad distributor, i replaced it today with no luck as i went to do the timing i see that the line on the crank will only get to about one inch away from the timing tab with the dist. fully turned and has hard hot start when adjusted to that point ,car runs good at anything above idle when the timing is about two n a half inchs away from the timing tab but has the bad idle...long explaination but my question is with these syptoms could the timinb belt be off by a tooth or two and run the way the car does? by the way no cel on the car had one when i bought it for o2 sensor replaced it and no more light...car seems to have power like the timing is close but the car has never ran right since i bought it so i cant say for sure..ANY help would be much apreaciated thanks....

 

On the crankshaft pulley, there are three marks close to each other. There is also a fourth mark further away. When the timing light is set to zero, you want to align the middle mark of the group of three to the pointer. The marks can be hard to see, because they get worn out by hitting up against the timing belt cover. You may want to use some whiteout to easily see the marks.

When setting the timing, you need to short the service connector under the glove box to set the timing, or you will be fighting the ECU the whole time to get the timing right.

 

And if that doesn't help, you should probably open the upper timing cover & check the camshaft timing. (I'm guessing the timing belt was JUST changed?)

 

It was the three lines that were like two n a half inches away from the tab ecu jumper was in and timing belt was done before I bought the car"8 months ago" I've been driving it like this since I bought it just been dealing with the crapy idle until I had the money to fix it...looks like I'm gonna have to pull the cover n see what's up with the timing belt marks

 

OK, just a couple things to check - to rule out strange problems.

- Front pulley slipping
Make a mark across the face of the front pulley, from the center "hub" out towards the rim where the timing notches are. After driving around a few days check to make sure the outer part hasn't moved against the hub. Hidden in there somewhere is a small layer of hard rubber & that can slip if it ever gets soaked in oil. Not real high probability but easy to check & rule out.

- Distributor internals
Oil inside the distributor? Red powder? Either one can indicate a problem.

- Cam timing marks
Always turn the crankshaft forwards, which is counter-clockwise when you're looking at the timing belt. Use a socket on the crankshaft pulley, not on the camshaft.
There's an arrow on the camshaft sprocket, turn the crank until it's at least visible. Then look for the REAL timing marks. 2 little dimples out at the teeth of that sprocket. Those dimples have to line up with the top surface of the head. Or what's more visible is the top edge of the metal shroud between the belt & the head. When it gets close, then look at the CRANKshaft & line up the one single mark with the pointer. Now check the dimples at the cam-sprocket.

 

The distributor is a "new used" from junkyard..car runs a little better with the new dist. The lines on the pulley being the two n half inchs from the tab on the right side of the tab would that be advanced or retarded on the timing?could valve adjustment have anything to do with the timing problem? I will mark the pulley today to see if there is any slippage.

 

Not sure I completely understand your questions, but here goes...

The pulley is directly attached to the crankshaft, so the position of those notches is the reference for timing the camshaft & the spark. Adjusting valve lash won't affect them at all.

The single notch on the pulley lines up with the pointer (molded into the lower timing cover) right AT TDC. That one is used for camshaft timing.

The set of 3 notches on the crank pulley (to the left of the single notch) are located at 15 degrees before TDC, for the purpose of spark timing.