Questioni was asked to get my dads bosses 1950 ford car to run that has been sitting in storage for as long as i can remeber so he can sell it but i am not getting any spark at all and it looks like it has every thing new in the distributor and i repealed the coil and it still wont spark can you give any more suggestions on what my be the problem and how to test it and just to make sure i am rite it is a positive ground rite thank you for your help
AnswerI'm not sure what you mean by repealing the coil - but if you changed it, you should probably put the original coil back on, unless you are certain you have right one. Coils very seldom fail, unless they are leaking oil.
I assume you took a spark plug out of the engine and laid it on top of the engine with the high voltage wire to it connected, and then cranked the engine while someone looked for a spark at the end of the spark plug - right? And you didn't see any spark at all?
If so, usually, this problem is caused by dirty or oxidized points in the distributor.
The way to check this out is to get a voltmeter or a test light and put it on the wire that comes from the + terminal of the coil to the side of the distributor - not the fat high voltage, wire, the thin 6 volt wire. The other lead of the voltmeter or test light has to be grounded to the + terminal of the battery to complere the circuit or you won't get a reading.
If you see - 6 volts there with the ignition turned on, the points are not making contact. Slowly turn the engine by pulling on the fan belt - turn it at least 1/4 of a turn, to see if at any point the voltage on that terminal drops to near zero. If it does, the points are OK - and we'll have to look elsewhere, but since that is usually the problem, we'll try that first. If the voltage just stays up there at -6 volts, the points are not working.
To fix that, you can temporarily clean the contact surfaces of the points with very fine sandpaper. Fold it so the grit is on both sides of the fold, and spread the points with your finger and insert the sand paper between the two contact surfaces, then let the points spring closed to put pressure on the sandpaper, then drag the sandpaper back and forth so as to clean off the crud. Remove the sandpaper and blow the grit off the surface of the points. This will usually get the car running. The points and condenser should be replaced soon after this, because the problem will keep coming back if you don't.
If that doesn't get it running, post a follow up question to me and I'll give you some more things to check.
Dick
