John, I have seen it slow the starter down or make it so slow it won't
start, but I have personally never seen it totally stop all rotation of the
engine. I am sure you have heard of the famous "heat soak" problem that
Chevy is famous for, so you may want to look into a heat shield for the
starter, or go with a mini starter if the timing doesn't fix the issue
totally. However, I doubt even that is the whole story, but maybe. What's
the story on the age and quality of your solenoid?
Frankly. I'm going to be very surprised if you tell us that timing was the
whole problem, however, there's no doubt it's a contributing factor. I
would put money on it being two or more issues. You are going to need to
eliminate them until you find the problem(s). After the timing, inspect the
electrical connections at the battery and solenoid. What condition are your
battery cables? What diameter? How clean are the terminals? Wire brush
terminals, make sure connections are tight, and verify you have over 14
volts coming back to the battery when the engine is running. You should
also have your battery tested by a parts store under load.
Just curious, have you checked the oil level lately? What type and weight
of oil are you using? How much oil pressure do you get at idle and high
rpms?
Steve
> Subject: [Chevelle-list] Hot start probs
>
> For about the third time now, always on a really hot day with the engine
> also hot from use and then parked for a little while, my El Camino doesn't
> want to turn over. I thought it might be the starter itself because the
> engine doesn't turn at all. The fix seems to be to wrap a towel around the
> radiator cap and very slowly turn it to ease off the pressure, then open
it
> and then let the engine cool down for about ten minutes. After that I put
> the radiator cap back on and it starts totally normally.
>
> I do know that the timing is a little too advanced and I hope to address
> that tonight or tomorrow morning. I recently tried advancing it just a bit
> to see if it would change how she runs and it did, but not for the
better. I
> am getting some pinging again on hard acceleration. Could that be enough
to
> make it not want to turn at all when hot?
>
> This is a 1958 block 283 w/ an Edelbrock Performer intake and Edelbrock
> 500cfm carb, an HEI distributor from a 83 Blazer, and a .442 lift cam (or
so
> I've been told).
>
> The first time this happened, I thought I somehow seized the engine. I
hate
> that feeling. It's still always a bad feeling though to be parked
somewhere
> and your engine won't turn at all.
>
> Thanks for any ideas.
>
> John Nasta
>
>
>
