1990 Mighty Max refuses to start No matter what timing.

[BillHilly]

So, I've set my 2.4L 4g64 8V SOHC engine timings all correctly. The crankshaft to balance shaft to camshaft are all lined up and at BTDC. However, my distributor, when lined up with it's notch and slotted in, it has to rotate a bit and then it is absolutely not pointing at the number 1 plug. More so the 4. I've fiddled with the timings and it just won't start. It's getting fuel, I put a new Optimum pump in and can smell it, and it's getting spark to all four plugs. The water pump went out and I drove it home but it never hit the red line and was running when shut off, but the timing belt was pretty damn loose and worn looking.

I've tried flipping plug wires, and it failed to do anything. It just refuses to start. Cranks over smoothly and I hear no damage to the engine. I believe it is the first generation of the blocks as it doesn't have a hydraulic tensioner for the timing nor a crankshaft position sensor. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[SubGothius]

By any chance did you disassemble and rebuild your distributor?

I'm not sure if it's the same for the 2.4L, but when I did that on my 2.6L, I found the dizzy wound up always a "half-tooth" off at best, no matter how I inserted it into the head. Inserted one way, I couldn't advance the timing enough, but pulling it out and reinserting it one tooth over, I couldn't retard it enough.

Eventually I realized the dizzy drive gear has an odd number of teeth, but the advance mechanism couples to the dizzy shaft with a pair of opposed pins, so if you reassemble it with the advance coupled the wrong way around, you wind up with the drive gear a half-tooth out of sync with the rotor, and the alignment mark is ~180° off.