Did the seal on my distributor housing last night (87 sami, 1.3 engine), and went to start it this morning for work, it was running real rough, and would die if I let off the gas. Loosened the distributor, and spun it till I could start it and have it stay running. It ended up all the way the other direction as far as it would go... All I did was pull the 3 bolts, slide it back, RTV it, and slide it back in, I don't think I spun it at all. Any ideas? Thanks.

Sounds like it's 180 degrees off.

Thats what I thought too, but how did it get that way?

You may just be a tooth off. I hate pulling the distributor for this reason. I wouldn't think it would run 180 degrees off. I do know that if you put the dist. back in and it won't start, if you are close, you can turn it all the way with the bolt in  in one direction or the other, and when it starts it will kind of tell you which direction you are off by tooth. Then you have to kind of feel  to find the right tooth. You should be at a pretty close to smooth idle with the bolt on the distributor close to center. If you have it all the way to one side or the other to idle smooth, you may be off by a tooth  and be too far advanced or retarded.
That's all I could surmise.

-Adam 

When you remove the distributor housing by removing the three bolts and pulling the housing towards the firewall to open it up, you cause the rotor to turn.  If you pull it too far, the gears unmesh, In pushing it back together, the gears may not mesh exactly in the same position as when they came apart.

At this point, you need to hand crank the engine until the 10 degree BTDC mark on the flywheel is aligned with the notch on the inspection hole in the bellhousing (driver' side - there may be a rubber plug in the inspection hole) then remove the valve cover and check the postion of the valves on the #1 cylinder. 



 They should be closed (cam lobes away from the rocker arms) indicating that the #1 cylinder is in the ignition cycle.  If not, then you need to turn the crank clockwise until the timing mark reappears  and/or the #1 valves are in the closed position.



Remove the distributor cap and check to see if the rotor point is aimed at the #1 sparkplug. 



If not, either adjust accoringly or remove the adjuster bolt, extract the rotor shaft then re-insert it so that when reseated it points at the #1 sparkplug point AND the ajusted bolt is in the middle of the adjuster range. 




It may take several tries to do this as when you remove and re-insert the rotor shaft as it will rotate when it meshes with the driving gear on the camshaft.

Once this is done, your engine will run correctly.

Pics courtesy of Chilton's Total Car Care Import Trucks and SUVs 2-CD set -- run out in a BUYING FRENZY and get a copy!  Part # C3050

Hope this helps!

I need to do a drawing on this one...

I know there is info on doing this in the manuals but they can be a little confusing, and your description here seems to be a little less complicated. I always end up popping the distributor out and recranking the engine a few times till I find the sweet spot but it would be nice to just reinstall the distributor in the correct position the first time.

-Adam