Hey all:

Just picked up a 79 with 90,000 original miles on it. Having some trouble getting it to start.

I'm not getting any spark out of the trailing ignition coil. Replaced the coil, still no spark. On the 79, there aren't the same ignitor boxes as the newer ones, right? What should I check now?

 

Check the points?

 

The old style ignitors on the SA22C's are prone to failure, the haynes manual has the testing procedure for the ignitors. If the dizzy and coil is happy, then it's probably the ignitor.

 

There are no ignitors on the 79, it has an old style points system, do like the first post advised and check the points.

 

You're talking about the contact points inside the distrbuter, right? How do they affect whether or not there is spark coming exclusively from the trailing ignition coil? Shouldn't there still be spark getting to the distributer, just not the rest of the way to the plugs if the contacts were bad?

 

if the contacts are bad enough to not colas the feild then yeah it can prevent the coil from firing.

 

Contacts are all good, it's definately not getting any spark from the ignition coil (which is new). Are there any points before then that fail on a 79? What else can I check?

 

i don't know crap about points sytems but this will enlighten us all.
http://autorepair.about.com/cs/gener.../aa052502a.htm
whatever the signal be it points or ignitor, sounds like the dizzy isn't telling the coil to shoot spark. you did check the points and not the contacts on the dizzy cap right? I have a feeling you read it the wrong way.

 

Well, how about this. (this is probably a bad way to check though!).

If I hold the leading feed above where it connects to the dizzy cap, I get a spark jumping the gap. If I hold the trailing feed above the dizzy cap where it's supposed to connect, I get no spark.

Now, if I take the leading feed and hold it above the dizzy cap where the trailing feed is supposed to go, I get a spark jumping the gap.

If I take the trailing feed and hold it above the dizzy cap where the leading plug is supposed to go, no spark.

So, no spark from the trailing either way, but the leading will spark on either point of the dizzy cap.

Make sense? I'm new to these old ignition systems, so I don't know if there's another possible failing point before the trailing ignition coil. Or for all I know the trailing coil doesn't fire at startup or something.

 

check the power wires to the coil and see if it is getting voltage.

 

right makes sense. If your 100% sure the trailing coil is still good, then your "trigger" if you will for the coil is not working. When the trigger doesn't send the signal to the coil, no sparky. Like was said earlier if your sure your coil is good, you need to get a haynes manual and do the procedures for checking points. The points are the trigger for the coil and if they go bad the trailing coil will not know to spark. That I think is your problem. have you also double checked to make sure your connection to the coil are nice and tight, like the negative side and such. Just trying to throw out some other possibilities. If coil is getting power and its a good coil then it has to be the trigger.

Ron

 

Ok, gotcha. Guess I was thinking weird, forgot that since it's a rotary it has 2 sets of contact points:P

So, if the points are bad (will check next), can I get them from NAPA or something?

 

just checked autozone has them. You have to special order them and they are 8.99 each need 2 to do both, might as well change em both if one is bad. napa or someone else might have them in stock.

 

The trailing ignition on a '79 is only operational part time. Does the car start and run? If there is no spark at idle, then you have problems, but during cranking, I don't think that the trailing is operational.

Points scare me in that nuclear war/carney type of way, so I ditched them as soon as I could and dropped a dizzy from an '81 into my car, complete with ignitors. I'd advise you to do the same.

 

Yah, that's kinda what I was thinking we would end up doing, or using the 2nd gen system type thing.



Well, thanks for all your help guys, we fixed the problem.

Turns out, one of the wire inside the distributer WASN'T EVEN FREAKING CONNECTED. So, that was pretty much the problem. I wonder how long the car had been driven without the trailing plugs...

Now, we just need to get it to start:P

 

haha well hey maybe someone else will search sometime and learn something from these posts