car won't start, again

is the can turning? and if I read this right, you've been cranking this with no distributor?

Yes it turns & no I have never cranked the car with no dist. What I am asking is, are there any short cuts to getting my car to start. I believe I messed up the timing pretty bad by removing & replacing the dist. & rotor without marking anything.I need it running long enough to drive to the mechanics. I didn't mark the dist. position on the engine nor did I mark the rotor position on the dist. housing each time I removed the both of them. So am I correct in assuming that now the timing is so far off that the car won't start? and I wouldn't know how to time it even if I had a timing light & what not I've been advancing & retarding the dist. while completely assembled but I can't get a break. Can I do anything else shy of setting the timing ?to get it started

remove number one plug, rotate engine by hand until piston is at top dead center and marrk on crank is at the pointer. remove distributor and install it to fire number one plug
and yes you have cranked it without distributor if you had it placed wrong!

Thanks mrelin2021. Let me ask you this un related question if I can. Same car, it has 166,000 miles on it, 5 speed manual transmission. I'm guessing you know mine is the base model not the GSI. My question is:can I drop a 1.8 liter 93 Storm GSI engine into my car with my tranny?

my guess would be yes with the ecm for it. but chevy or toyota service can tell you for sure.