The Cal-look Lounge

Ok, so at the last local drag race I competed in (about a month ago or better), my car stopped dead in the staging lanes just prior to heading up for my fourth timed run during time trials.  Like someone turned the key off.  Thought the coil wire popped off, so I check it out.  Still on.  Car turns over just fine, just won't fire. I figured my compufire unit took a dump, so later on at home I swap out a set of points and condensor.  Still no spark.  While in my old hometown last week I bought a new coil, and the shop guy recommended I try checking my coil wire to see if it's no good.  I swap out one from a running car, still no dice.  Install the new coil, nothing still.

I'm absolutely going nuts trying to track this thing down, as it was just all of a sudden that the car quit running.  Anybody have any ideas?

Have a friend turn the car over while you check for spark. Pull off a plug lead, and go backwards from there until you find the culprit.

Check your fuses and grounds, a loose ground will cause a nightmare if you don't physically touch it to make sure it's fastened tight

sorry if I missed if you've said you already checked.... but is there 12V going to 1.5 terminal on coil?

About the only thing I know for certain is there's no spark between the coil and distributor... need to get an extra set of hands available to go through everything one by one, or else get a remote starter switch, lol.  It's so strange.  It just stopped running, and that was it.   Only time that ever happened before was when I had the coil wire between the coil and distributor pop off.

so you do have 12V to 1.5 term on coil? You can do that alone... just turn ign switch to ON and go back to coil with voltmeter or even just a 12V test light and check for voltage @ 1.5 term. (+)

good luck

1970

I recently had the same issue like this with one of our shop cars... and it was a bad rotor... the engine had spark to the cap but to nothing to the cylinders... it was totally strange...

Anthony / ISP WEST

Yeah, I forgot to mention I installed a new rotor and cap.  Will check for 12 volts at the coil tonight, hopefully.

Also make sure the center contact in the cap is making contact with the rotor.

As an update, I hooked up a test light on my lunch hour.  There is indeed healthy voltage going to the coil from the ignition switch.  Didn't hook up a voltmeter, but the light came on bright and true. I also checked to see if my distributor may have shifted, but no such luck.  Don't think it's a timing thing.  There just seems to be no spark.

Had a similar problem myself , replaced everything from the coil down , turned out to be spark plugs , ran up NGK 8's for 20mins or so while I bedded the cam in and balaced it all .
Went to start it again some time later and got nothing , turns out the 8's wernt up to the head temp and deteriated , swaped them for a set of NGK7's and all well  8)

Running Bosch plugs, never had any issues with them previously... there doesn't seem to be any spark at the distributor from the coil, which is the weird part.

Just for duck soup - Is the rotor turning - possible bad dist drive gear ? or dist not into drive ? Check the condensor too.

Highly doubt it's a drive issue, as the distributor hasn't been out of the car in I don't know how long..  It just stopped running, like someone turned the key off.  The condensor and points in the 009 at the moment are brand new and haven't been fired.

hook your test light to the - side of the coil and turn the key on. then with the cap off turn the motor over with a socket until the light comes on and check the static timming of the distributor.  hopefully it is off.

just because its new, doesnt mean its good

The only reason I don't suspect the condensor and/or points is because the issue began when I had a compufire in there, and I initially thought the thing burned out.  Putting in points and the condensor didn't do anything, and I recall seeing no spark between the coil and distributor the day the failure occurred (in the pits, another racer helped me), so I replaced the coil.  Still no good.  Very weird stuff.

What should static timing be set at?  Last time I set my timing (engine running) I believe it was set at 38 degrees total (running semi hemi heads).  Don't recall what the initial timing was, off the top of my head.

10 degrees BTDC will get you close enough to fire it up.

As an update, worked on the car a bit with a buddy last night.  Full 12 volts going to the coil, no spark off the coil to the distributor nor anyplace I grounded the high-tension lead.  Rotor turns, points are opening and closing (gapped correctly, too).  Very strange stuff, all wires on the coil have solid connections.  Perhaps the car is hexed?  Anybody know any black magic?  Lol.

What other wires do you have connected to the coil other then the distributor and +?  If you are running a tach or anything else I would suggest removing those wires and trying to start the car again.  If one of these wires grounds somewhere to the chasis it will ground out everything-happened to a tach wire on me once.

Only other wires are a tach wire and the condensor wire. We tried it without the tach wire, but didn't do anything.  Didn't check for spark without the tach wire on, so that may be worth a shot?  At this point the plugs may be flooded as the engine is definitely getting fuel.  Lol.

Ryan, it just came to me. I had this problem once and it ended up being a junk Autometer Tach. I replaced everything -cap, rotor, Ignitor, coil, distrubutors and finally I left off the Green Tach wire on the negative side and it fired right up. I was soooo pissed. My car had been sitting for 3 weeks because the Tach was  a POS.


TRY LEAVING OFF THE TACH WIRE TO COIL!!!!!!

You know, I'm going to revisit this , as the tach was doing really weird things ever since I hooked it up.  Jumpy needle, flashing shift light at random points, and every connection was tight.  Very annoying.  Never had any issues with starting the car, though.  I bought it used and the previous owner said it must be a loose connection somewhere; never mind the fact that he had splices on all the wires coming off the tach already, really shoddy work that made it impossible to do a nice clean installation.  I'll try that again and see what's up.  AT this point, nothing would suprise me! lol

I would start from the beginning again:

Did you check your ground and positive strap on the battery and the ground from your tranny to chasis-I would remove all the ground connections and clean to be sure.

Did you check the fuses?

Did you remove any unnecessary wire from the coil?

Did you put a volt meter across the battery terminals to verify it is fully charged?

Then verify that you are getting the correct power to the coil.  If that is fine then it is the distributor-do you have something else around that you can try?

Are you running a 009 or maybe a 010-I had a 010 points ground to the body once so it would not fire.  Also even new condesors do not work sometime.  I would just remove the whole distributor and swap it with something else to check.

Car is now running again... had to disconnect every single wire associated with the tach before it would fire.  Apparently the tach is junk, as John suggested.  Given that it was wired 100 percent correct and I've had issues with it from the get-go, I will be contacting the seller, bought it used off the Samba.  He claimed it worked great in a race car and street car, and put the blame on me with my last inquiry, but it's never worked right despite being hooked up 100 percent right. So now I'm back to no tach yet again...

Good luck with that! Sounds like he was just trying to unload a pos and you will probably never get a reply from him, or if you do, he will say you screwed it up. If that's the case, let everyone know so we don't give him anymore business. Congrats on getting it running again

His name is Tony John Quinn... said it came out of a race car and had very little use, but the sloppy crimping job on the wires coming out the back of the tach and faded needle color leads me to think otherwise.

I just emailed the guy, here is what I wrote:

It's taken me a while to provide an update on this tach, but I suspect it had issues to begin with, judging by the crimped connections on the wires coming out the back.  The tach was wired correctly into my car, utilizing the diagram off the Auto Meter web site, and from the get-go I had issues with it.  Jumping needle, flickering shift light, and ultimately, at the last local drag race, the car stopped dead on my fourth pass.  I just yesterday had the time to track down the issue to an apparent internal short in the tach, as once I disconnected the tach's wires (dash lights, power wire, everything associated with it) the car then would start and run just fine.
When I reconnected the tach's wiring -- and there's not a bare wire anywhere -- it immediately blew the first fuse on the block, where the power wire for the tach was hooked up.
I sold off the other two gauges I purchased as part of the package deal (boost gauge, fuel pressure gauge) almost immediately after I received them as I didn't need them, but the tach was a needed item and has not functioned as described.
It's taken me a while to tinker around with the car primarily due to my job; I work for a small town weekly newspaper and haven't had hardly any time to work on the car.  I also bracket race on the weekends and wanted a tach the sake of shifting consistenly, but this tach is essentially useless to me.
Let me know if you have any ideas on how to resolve this, as I'm hoping we can come to some sort of mutual agreement.  I don't expect a full refund by any stretch, but would be open to any suggestions on what might be appropriate?

Thanks,
Ryan

 An attempt to resolve the issue with the seller resulted in a nice, rude response.  I'm pretty well set on never buying a used tach ever again, and will most definitely never do business with this cat ever again.

Screw him. Autometer can repair it for you, I've known a few people that had a shorted out tach and Autometer repaired theirs for $40 if I recall correct.

I asked him in my last email what I could have done to screw it up, but no reply.  Guess he's done with me, in his last email he called me a hack and said "it's your prob."

on a side note, the 1968 911S tachometer i got off ebay appeared to be broken too. it was only discovered when it travelled from US->Europe->US and North Hollywood Speedometer took it apart to convert it to 4 cylinders. but i don't think we can buy used parts and expect a warranty. i wish though... i never sell parts that are broken or not working properly.

but hey, i'm sure we're all glad you got your car running again. too bad of all the expenses you made but at least you know those parts will last for another while :)

I figure it can't hurt to have a spare coil sitting around the garage...;D  Naw, I'm just bugged the guy was such a jerk about it, wouldn't even suggest to me anything I could have done wrong in wiring it up.  I may just do as John says and send to AutoMeter to have it checked out, we'll see.  At least I can cruise around in my beater, still have the monster tach in the window even if it isn't functional... does make me a ricer?  Lol. ;D

Quick question, something I haven't thought of till now...too little , too late as usual.  Is the ring around the face of the AutoMeter Monster tachs (the part that has the RPM/shift light setting switch and internal light mounted) supposed to turn freely around the perimeter of the tach?  Mine does, and it just doesn't seem like that should be that way.  I could be wrong, but just curious?

I dont think thats normal ,
I know mine doest spin :)

That's what I was thinking... if I was going to Sacramento in September I would seriously be looking for this pecker to see if he's brave enough to call me names to my face.  Worst case scenario he'd be getting escorted out by BOR security if he turned hostile.  Lol.

dude, don't worry about these guys. Just get your car dialed in and go enjoy driving it. It's a waste of your own time to predict conflict with these types of guys. Someday they will piss off the wrong person. You don't have to be that "wrong person", as they are usually just as  much of an asshole as the seller.

Have fun

Yeah, Jim, I wouldn't seriously go pressing conflict... just venting,lol.  I'm glad to be able to drive the car right now rather than confusedly look at it in my driveway, wondering what is hindering operations.

I'm at the point where I need to make some sort of new progress on it, such as POR-15-ing the interior pans...also need to pull the engine so I can remove the rear apron and install a new engine bay seal.  A shortage of time makes it tough to get anything done.

we should start a club