Re: Ignition System Problems

Posted by HH56 On 2014/4/19 18:40:48

You can totally eliminate the OD question by temporarily removing that second wire connected to the coil terminal. One wire will go to dist and, if they are separate connectors, the other will go to one of the terminals on the top row of kickdown switch (row away from plunger end). Just let that wire hang. If both wires are crimped together and share the same connector at the coil, ohm it out and disconnect at the kickdown switch. Let it hang but make sure it does not touch ground.

Once that wire is disconnected it eliminates any possible problem with OD switches. I would check just the spark next. I do it methodically by making sure it is present and good without the distributor in the picture but you may have a different method.

For my method I disconnect the wire from low voltage coil terminal at dist and position or hold the high voltage wire end about 1/8" away from the block. With ign on, touch the low voltage wire coming from coil to the block or a good ground and see if there is a spark when you pull it away from block. Hold the wire itself or if you want to hold the connector, use gloves because the back emf can be fairly healthy if you are touching the metal connector. It will not be a big fat blue spark like modern cars but should be yellowish orange and sufficient to jump 1/8-3/16 or so without any difficulty.

If you have that, then connect the low voltage wire back to dist and crank the engine to check the spark. It should be equal to what you saw when manually touching the wire to block. If all that is good, something else is causing the no start. If you have no spark at a test then depending on which test failed, something is amiss in the coil/dist circuit and we need to figure out which.