Im having problems starting my 1976 Harley Davidson sportster

SOURCE: Adjusting timing on Harley Davidson 1976 sportster

The advance timing should be 35° before Top Dead Center. This is how you find out which mark this is.

Get the rear wheel of the bike off the ground, remove the spark plugs, shift the bike into fourth gear, and remove the timing plug from the left engine case.
Now, take an ordinary PLASTIC DRINKING STRAW and insert it into the front spark plug hole. Do not use anything else or you stand a chance of it breaking and then you'll have to pull the head to get it out. The plastic straw will bend but not break.
Bump the rear wheel in the direction that it turns while riding down the road until the piston pushes the straw all the way up and just barely starts going back down. Look into the timing hole. You should see a timing mark. This is the Top Dead Center mark. Now, bump the rear wheel BACKWARDS until you see another mark. This should be the ADVANCED TIMING MARK. The piston should 7/16" down from top dead center.

On this model Sportster the timing is advanced by a mechanical advance mechanism. These units are notorious for wearing out and not contolling the timing very well. You must remove the breaker plate to inspect this mechanism. Mark the position of the plate before you remove it. If the pins and holes in the flyweights are worn, replace the unit. Replace it with a good needle bearing unit. Replace the points and reset the gap at 0.018 - 0.020".

SOURCE: 2000 Harley Davidson XLC Sportster 883 won't start

the heat from the bulb being continiuosly on may have melted a wire inside your headlight?

SOURCE: 1976 harley davidson sportster 1200

Harey Davidson gaurds it's manuals hard and has it's employees find outside sorces of the manuals and crush them. You can get on some of the harly forums and ask around and someone might email you what you need. bike bandit will sell you a manuel and the harley manels persuppose that your a trained harly tech and don't tell you things that you shouls have learned during training. So if you want to fix your own bike ( I think you should ) get an aftermarket book and read the whole thing.