I ordered parts.
And in due time, the parts arrived.
Points, condenser, rotor. Sparking plugs. Wires for the
sparking plugs. A timing light, dwell/rpm/volt meter, a new set
of angled go/no go gauges.
I placed all of this stuff in close proximity to the roofless
automobile, and raised the hood. The greasy lump greeted me as
it always has, a collection of parts and relationships that defy
any rational explanation (the distributor has a vacuum *retard*
unit, of all things).
First came the plugs. Number one came out, was inspected ("Ewww,
this one is all black looking!")and tossed into the dustbin. Its
wire was also discarded, and in went a shiny new plug. A new
green TRF wire connected it to the distributor (vacuum
retard?)cap. That looked nice. Lather, rinse, repeat for the
other five. All those green wires looked so much better than the
black ones they replaced.
So, that wasn't too bad. Nothing lost, nothing broken, no
knuckles bashed or bleeding. What's next?
Two clips, and the distributor cap came off. The rotor was
removed and placed into the glove box. This, of course, now
means that there is no room for the glove, but if the rotor
cracks a glove won't get me home. The little screw that holds
the condenser in was carefully removed (it wouldn't do to drop it
into the distributor), the nut holding the condenser wire was
taken off, and the condenser went the way of the sparking plugs.
The other little screw that holds the points in came out, and the
old points were added to the growing pile of replaced parts.
The new points went right in. I noted that they had a metal post
for the nut, unlike the nylon one on the old set. Good.
Obviously a superior part. Harder to strip out.
I have a large book full of instructions, and it yielded the
necessary point gap. This was set, and I moved on to static
timing. You are supposed to connect a lamp between the wire
coming from the distributor and the positive side of the battery.
The engine gets set to 24 degrees BTDC, and the lamp should be
lit. The engine is slowly rotated to TDC, and at 12 deg. BTDC,
the lamp should go out.
My lamp stayed lit.
The implications of this were a little slow in coming, because I
figured I was just doing it wrong. Said the hell with it, put
the rotor back in, put the cap back on, and went to fire it up.
I figured I'd just hook up the timing light and time it. It's a
better method anyway.
It wouldn't start.
It didn't even act as if it wanted to start. No pops, bangs, or
stumbling hesitation. Nothing. I pulled off one of the plug
wires and propped it up where I could see it, close to a ground
and far away from the petrol filter. Cranked a little, and
observed that there was no spark.
Humm.
Took the cap back off, checked all the connections, checked the
gap. Used a test light and noted that current could in fact pass
through the contacts when they were closed. Noted once again
that the new points had a metal post, where the old ones had a
nylon post.
The new ones had a metal post where the old ones had a nylon
post.
And the light never went off.
A light went on.
I replaced the new points with the old points, gaped them right
quick, and put the cap back on. Noted that the rotor was on the
fender where I left it, took the cap off, replaced the rotor,
replaced the cap, and hit the switch.
It lit right off.
So I checked the timing, the advance (vacuum retard?), the dwell.
Everything was fine. The sky was clear, the top down, and the
motor was running.
So instead of setting the valves, which you do cold anyway, I
took the dog for a ride.
What the hell, she deserved it.
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