Jon Pegler wrote:To remove the oil pump gear you have to remove the bottom bevel gear from the crank.
Even if you haven't taken that off, it doesn't mean that the oil pump gear is correctly meshed as it can slide out of mesh and the timing dots can become misplaced.
To re-set;
Align top and bottom bevel dots correctly.
Pull the oil pump gear out of mesh and turn until the LH upper dot lines up with the dot on the crankshaft.
This dot is behind the bottom bevel gear and marked onto the end of a tooth on the crankshaft.
It is not easy to see.
Once the oil pump gear is in the correct position, fit the points drive gear dot in line with the RH dot on the oil pump gear.
Jon
That hidden dot was what I was missing. Greatly appreciate it. I pulled the oil pump large gear out of line and turned it a few notches and now all the dots line up at once. This means that the valves are timed, correct? It seems to take a lot of turns to get them all to line back up again (as in I turned it ~20 times and I don't think they ever lined up again). Now, I go to check the ignition timing with a degree gauge on the left crank plug. I found top dead center (without a piston stop, so very rough but best I could) and then set the gauge at 0 degrees. I hooked up a volt meter to the points to see when they open or close. Then the manual says to go 60 degrees before TDC and then rotate the engine slowly till the points go to 0 volts (open) and this should occur at whatever the correct advance degree for the 450 is. I found that the volt meter went to 0 volts 90 degrees after TDC... Then they close again and the volt meter reads the voltage at 0 degrees on the paper dial gauge after going a full revolution. Does that mean 1) I am doing the process wrong? 2) I assembled the timing gears wrong? 3) something else.
Thanks again for all the help. Hopefully she'll be running tomorrow...
*the slash mentioned below may be the solution to the timing being off