the best way to set the timing is to pull out the spark plug on the #1 cylinder. Have someone turn the motor over by putting a breaker bar on the crank bolt, this way they can turn it slowly. Hold your finger on the hole and stop them when you feel your finger being pushed out. This will tell you it is on the compression stroke . Now you look at your balancer and see where it is on the timing marks, it should be close to 0 deg. BTCD. Turn it back or forward to get it at about 10 BTDC. Now make sure that the motor does not turn and set the distributor with the rotor pointing at the #1 spark plug wire terminal on the cap. Put the plug back in and crank it up and see if it fires. If it backfires stop and rotate the balancer back around to tdc on the timing marks, remove the cap and see where the rotor is pointing. If it is pointing exactly opposite of the #1 terminal than it is 180 degrees out , basically it is firing on the exhaust stroke. If it is pull the distributor back out with the motor still at tdc and set it with the rotor pointing at #1 again. This time you should have it nailed. If this doesn't work then you have other issues. Did you put bigger injectors or mass air sensor on the car?
