What's The Point?

OK,thanks. I guess I miss my '77 LTD Country Squire now! Same engine, but w/Duraspark & cats. Right at the moment, I'm not quite ready to go breakerless, as I believe the existing ignition should work as well as on all my Fords of the past. Anyway, I am now carrying an emery board that my sweetie uses on her fingernails, so I can scrape the points if this happens again...I dunno, it worked in the past...
Meanwhile, I'll continue to search for that resistor wire,disconnect it,and get a value.

 

Did this happen previous coil change? Coils new or old can be bad. Resistor wires don't fail that often.

 

The new coil was installed after the first burned points incident. I suppose I could test it, as the specs are in this thread.

 

Are you saying that the wire is not connected on either end and you measured 2 ohms in that wire?
If so, I think that would be the resistance wire. A regular wire, over a relatively short distance, is going to measure near 0 ohms.

 

No,that was the wire from firewall to Positive coil primary. I think I have to get at the top of the steering column at the ignition switch to disconnect the resistor wire there and at the firewall to get its resistance. I don't know why the wire from firewall to coil has such high resistance.

 

Well,there go the points again! A few weeks ago,I tried to get at the resistor wire to test it,but had no luck. It seems to me that you start by removing the steering wheel in order to get at the ignition switch,and then disconnect the coupling at the switch. There is another coupling at the base of the column underdash,but I could NOT get it apart. Who designed this? And I don't have a shop manual.
I doubt that anyone ever replaced the resistor wire,but I would like to test it. I'd have to get a puller for the wheel...Good Grief!
I've put about 3000 miles on the car since December and replaced the points three times. Why does this happen?
I could be mistaken about the puller, but I've had the lower part of the column uncovered, and no disconnect there.
And if I do the obvious and go Pertronix,I still have to worry about that stupid resistor wire. Aaaaarrggh!

 

Friday morning I went out there and yanked the cap off and checked the gap and then scraped the points with one of my girlfriend's emery boards. I rechecked the gap @ .017 and buttoned it up--and it ran fine. I know this was a crude approach to the problem,and that next time it'll be another set of points,or the breakerless kit mod--which still leaves the question of that resistor wire!

 

And another question. Hey who's been using my emery board?

 

Get rid of the points. Install one of these. Never have to worry about burning points again. No special tools and works well with stock coils.
Dave
http://www.amazon.com/PerTronix-912...=1433226095&sr=1-4&keywords=pertronix+ignitor

 

Blam! Blam! Two loud backfires as I was blitzing along at 70 mph,and the engine quit. The two backfires blew out the muffler again. It seems that the problem all along has been that the breaker plate in the distributor is free to wander. I don't know what holds it in place,as this never happened before. The tiny plastic button the plate slides on broke off and disappeared (and there was a second one loose under the plate,as if this happened before). Now the car is 90 miles from here at a good shop. The proposed solution is to replace the distributor. The other thing I wonder about is what is the nature of the backfire? Is unburned vaporized fuel igniting in the hot muffler? '73 Ford 400 V-8, Carb, points, no cats.

 

The exhaust backfire is caused by the timing retarding. And even if you wanted to swap to a Pertronix unit, if the breaker plate can't be locked down, you'd still have to replace the dizzy before installing it.

 

I don't know why the breaker plate is adrift,nor do I know exactly what holds it in position. When I took the cap off, the points were just closed,because they were not in contact with the cam at all. Kinda makes me wonder how the engine ran in the first place. Whatever else I do,that distributor will be replaced. And I still don't understand why the muffler gets blown up.

 

Retarded timing allows unburned fuel downstream, so that when it ignites, it turns your Cherry Bombs into cherry bombs.

 

Wow,so I guessed the right answer! My concern was any possible damage inside the engine,especially since I spent close to $1000.00 to replace both left & right rare & hard to find exhaust manifolds. The originals were both cracked,and these are '73-'74 only parts. So now I am going to call the mechanic 90 miles away and suggest a new distributor. I still don't understand what is supposed to hold the breaker plate in position, nor why it came adrift. And I'll do the muffler myself later (Only one on this car). Thanks for the responses!

 

Have you got a timing light and a vacuum guage?
Pretty cheap tools to keep track of a $1000 investment.