Help! Advanced or Retarded

[aeo]

Wait...

1. So, what caused you to try to do the timing in the first place?
2. If you think you got the pins in correctly, even if they are a little off, I would think you would have same symptoms in same RPM range, on flat ground, no matter what gear you are in.
3. If you have a new timing belt, or if it is several years old, why wouldn't this be a situation where the belt has jumped a tooth? You need to take the timing cover off.
4. Do you have a boost gauge? What if your turbo is starting to go, and once the EGTs get to a certain height, the turbo begins to show its weakness? Timing might not be the issue.
5. What if there is an issue with the fuel pump, not timing?

One way or another. You should be able to verify timing (I think) by setting a pin in the bell housing, then finding the slot open at the front cover/fuel pump. Look at the video I posted above.

I bought my truck 3 years ago. I drove it for 9 months. Then it went into the shop. It has been in the shop for two years as of the end of this month. My son is finishing his first year of high school..... I had thought I could get by on a year without the truck, it turned into two years, and right after I started the project, I sold the truck that I should have kept and actually used while the project was going.

In other words, in the past two years I've had the Defender, but have not had the Defender, I've watched my son go from the kid who wants to go camping to the kid who might like to go camping if he has the time, and all the while I could have kept the Disco, but I was stupid and sold it, and now I see it on trips with the new owner on Facebook every other weekend.

In the mean time, I've been without a bumper for two months because Rovers North can't figure out how to email me back about the new one I bought, but can't fit, the new Mantec tire carrier is flawed, can't be used without modification, and I've been up till midnight every night for the past three months working from home, without pay, missing my kids' band concerts and track meets, and not getting more than an hour in those three months to spend on working on the truck.... so.... yeah..... I feel your pain.

I've heard of people who managed to get their trucks running before their kids grew up, so I know it can be done, and you've got an early start!

In the end, it doesn't seem like you've got a terrible issue here, it really could just be a timing issue. You'll get it sorted soon enough.

I keep telling myself at least the kids like the truck. We've been in various states of projects with this truck since we got her, 6 years ago.

I started messing with the timing because I had a loss of power uphill, extra black smoke under load uphill, and my EGTs are climbing higher than they were a year ago on the same roads. It's worse when I pull our little 900# camper. I can barely get it to 45 mph on some hills. She ran great on the flats. Although she topped out at about 60-65 mph, which seems lower than I would like on a flat highway. I had some leaking issues with the IC and radiator so I replaced those. The oil cooler was after market and leaking so we put it back to the radiator. I've had a compression test done , replaced injectors, set the valve clearances. I don't think she's every overheated since I've had her. It's just the high EGTs and low power. New lift pump, and vacuum pump too. As well as new exhaust manifold gasket. I've stopped almost all the leaks, except the p-gasket. She did blow out a freeze plug a few months ago- it as after running for a few hours and it looked more like it fell out. Could have been an installation issue. After replacing that i has held pressure and been fine.

She had a turbo implode when I first got her after the engine swap. This turbo was used and the history is unknown so it could be the turbo. There isn't a lot of oil blow by from what I've asked about in the past, it sounds nice and smooth, there is no play when I have the hoses off and mess with it, and it gets decent boost, 14psi.