I'm probably just imagining things, but on my recently acquired '92 SPi cooper, when I drive it with the window down, I get the feeling I can hear a slight pinking from the engine under load. It's not that bad, and to be honest it could just be something vibrating, or a sound from the exhaust (my son swears it only started after changing the exhaust to a playmini cat back) but it made me wonder.
Of course I understand that you can't really check the timing on these cars as it is under ECU control, nor can you achieve anything by rotating the distributor for the same reason, but is there any easy way to check static timing? I just wondered if there was any chance that a previous owner (it is from Japan) could have played with repositioning the reluctor ring on the flywheel?
Can't think of a way to check it - maybe put it at TDC and monitor the crank sensor output with a scope or something? I don't know, hence I am asking :)
