What's The Point?

I've got too many other things to worry about than the big one.
When that happens I'll bury my head in the sand and place both hands on my behind!

 

It's more like the old pseudo-Civil Defense "What To Do" poster: "Loosen all clothing, jewelry, belt, lean forward, head between your legs, and kiss your @$$ goodbye."

 

That's what I was thinking. Just trying to be gentle.

 

I really think it's great, all the help and talk on this forum. Thanx,guys. Now if I could only get this old car running right! So...I had the whole thing apart and could NOT find the resistor wire,if any. How did the 3 previous owners ever drive this thing? I know the last one put at least 15K miles on it. So this morning,I put it all back together with the new distributor, brand new points & condenser gapped to .017, brand new coil, and it started running rough almost immediately! How does that even happen? I must've driven 45 miles in all. At the end of the day,the sun was going down, and I was fed up, so I didn't scrape the points to see if that helped,although by this time, it seems to be the thing that is wrong,i.e.,too much voltage to the points. Earlier,at the local Cruise Nite, a guy with a 1970 Torino GT 429 suggested bypassing everything from coil to key. I could do that with the new resistor wire,but physically, where would it go exactly?
And the theory bugs me. The resistor is supposed to get hot and restrict voltage at low speeds,so then why did mine misfire at high speeds (one time explosively)!?
I mean I had ten of the Fords with points ignition,and never a problem like this.
Oh well,I'll probably go Pertronix and it'll still do this. (Cue up the old blues song "Stop Breaking Down" by Robert Johnson).

 

Just go Pertronix from this point. You'll be sooo happy! I just wish I were there to put my hands on it. Also, one more thing that popped into my head--if the engine is running lean, that lean mixture may be causing the ignition voltage to go much higher. Are the spark plugs ghostly white?

 

I had thought to pull the spark plugs,as they have about 3000 miles on them now. Carbs Unlimited in Auburn,WA did the carb rebuild,I just put it on. I doubt there's a problem with that. After the holiday,I'll check plugs and try the resistor wire bypass thing. Although it seems that the ignition wire is somehow connected to other wires before it gets to the switch.

 

The resistor wire is to cut voltage and doesn't change with speed or rpm's. Try opening your gap to .019 Your timing and fuel need to be correct. Sometimes when frustrated you can overlook and overthink your problem. Try watching to see if timing is steady at higher rpm's.

 

The point is now I'd be ready to beat the wagon to death with a sledge hammer and pull what's left of my hair out too!:banghead3:
Stick with it. You'll feel so good when this is over.
Just think of it as a bad dentist visit!

 

I think I would want to figure out the cause before I risked burning out a Pertronix.

 

That's correct, or ruin another distributor and other things.
Gotta be a broken wire in the resistor line or something hooked up back $$ed words!

 

I installed the resistor wire from coil+ to ignition switch. It is lying atop the intake manifold along the route that Ign,EGR,AC, Dashpot,choke wiring all take,looped a bit because it is one long wire! It is connected to the 4-element connector at the firewall. The thing is, I don't see ANYWHERE that a resistor wire such as this one could have possibly been in the wiring. Maybe there was a coil with internal resistance prior to all this? So,with the new coil,distributor,points,condenser,cap & rotor, things should be fine. But Nooooo!
What I did next was to put a different set of points in,and it ran ok. I gapped them at .017, checked dwell with the meter in spec for this engine. I got so happy I bought a new+battery cable,which was needed,and some gasoline. Drove a bit,and then the same old problem: Barely moving,embarrassingly stalled in traffic. So I scraped the points again with the emery board, which got me going well enough to get a mile home. Ain't that something? And the other side of all this is that I've already spent hundreds of dollars on just the ignition problem, and I am loath to spend much more.

 

Logic suggests that the points are getting too much voltage. Points don't need a lot of power to fire the plug and thus the mentioned resistor. A direct connection from switch to coil suggests the points are taking a full blast of 12v if not more.

Get that baby into a good auto electronics shop and pay the man.
They will know what is missing.

 

I agree. Now that you have the resistance wire hooked up apparently you didn't unhook the direct 12V feed so the points are still getting 12V.

I don't believe any of us are Pertronixs salesmen but I'd still suggest going Pertronixs and make sure you have a good 12V source.

 

That's an interesting theory--that 12V would come by another route! But we are going from coil+ direct to the ignition switch. The only other route is when you crank the engine and get max voltage to the points,and that goes through the ignition switch and thus must go through the resistor wire,which is the only wire that is connected to coil+. The coil is labeled for use with an external resistor.

 

I had to get into the battery area to repair the battery box, and hidden next to the battery is a voltage regulator! I don't suppose that could be the source of too much voltage...or maybe why the stereo turns itself up between stops.
I'm grasping at straws here...