timing question

i have a 65 coupe with a 289, while trying to start i get a loud backfire and that is it.  Witht the number 1 cylinder at top dead center the rotor button is point at about the 7 cylinder on the distributor, it is about 60 degrees off, what can i do to fx this problem.  It does not appear to be skipping timing or anything, i have turned the motor several times and it holding consistently at this setting.  Can you rewire the firing order to make this timing correct or does the distributor need to be pulled and reset???thanks  

You can do either one. I would be more concerned about what you did to bring this about,,,, that might help in recomending a fix.  

The 289 firing order is: 1-5-4-2-6-3-7-8
The number one cylinder is at the front of the passenger side of the engine
with 4 being at the back on the same side. The drivers side front of the motor is number 5 and continues sequentially to the back of that side of the motor to number 8. Make sure the plug wires coming out of the distributor cap are in that order in the direction the rotor under the cap rotates and then make sure the plug wires go to the right cylinders. You probably have them in the wrong order or the right order but off by one wire terminal.
Make sure you check your TDC timing reference mark (on the balancer) on the COMPRESSION stroke of the number ONE cylinder. When done right the rotor should be pointing at the number one spark plug wire terminal on the distributor cap when the number one piston is at TDC on the compression stroke and that spark plug wire should go to number one cylinder. Then do number 5 next the same way, etc.  

Jbirch has stated the obvious, but wires dont move themselves for no reason, if it was running fine previously. It may be the problem but what you were doing before this happened will lead to an answer faster.  

mechanicalguy48:
Jbirch has stated the obvious, but wires dont move themselves for no reason, if it was running fine previously. It may be the problem but what you were doing before this happened will lead to an answer faster.

Howdy, its been awhile since you've made a comment.

She said in a previous post that the points, cond, cap and rotor were changed and that the dist housing had been rotated a little bit. I just told her how to think about determining what's gone wrong in the other post (pretty much parallels what Jbirch and you have suggested)jlg  

Hey jlg, yeah I am still around. I post once in awhile, just not as much as I used to. As you can see I was trying to get the whole story rather then giving her a stock answer. Glad to see you already set her on the right track. Most of the reason I never looked at the other post was because I saw YOU had answered it so I knew that one was ok, and I didnt look at who had posted it.  

Thanks for all the help....i actually hooked all the wires back up just like the manual says to do but that was causing the backfiring.  A little history on the car, I just got the car and decided to do a little tuning up so i replaced all of the ignition items.  When i put it back together i had the problem, so i put the number 1 cylinder on top dead center and removed the distributor cap and the rotor button was aiming at number 3 on the distributor cap.  So i wired it with that being number 1 and then i went counter clockwise in the proper order and the car fired and ran like a champ.  Tomorrow I will pull the distributor and line it up properly so that when 1 is on top dead center, the rotor buttom will aim at the 1 on the distributor cap....once again thanks for all the help, I am new at this and am learning a lot in a short time...