How old is your battery?
What is the voltage during cranking?
Are you loosing a cell? or all the plates shorting out do to the mud in the bottom of the battery?

Sounds like once the alternator kicks in you have enough voltage. Do a battery test at one of the local shops and see how it performs.

I have a volt meter on my system to monitor status.

_________________
Aggressive Ted

http://cid-32f1e50ddb40a03c.photos.live ... %20Swinger


74 Swinger, 9.5 comp 254/.435 lift cam, 904, ram air, electric fans, 2.5" HP2 & FM70 ex, 1920 Holley#56jet, 2.76 8 3/4 Sure-Grip, 26" tires, 25+MPG

I want to thank everyone for their helpful tips. Special thanks to Ted for his advice.

I never did figure out exactly which wire was the issue, but I started with a new pigtail for the ECU, and when I starting in there wiring it up, I found so many bad wiring jobs from past owners, poor connections, mismatched wire gauges, no fusible link on the heavy circuits, wires going to nowhere from nowhere, etc., I rewired the whole engine harness. After that, she fires up every time. I had a small trash bag full of old wires before I was through, but now I'm sure its wired correctly, and as you'd imagine I've become much more comfortable with wiring issues.

Now I just have to wire the horn (that was missing when I bought the Dart), an electric washer bottle (it had the old floor pump, but that was missing as well) and I bought some Sebring convertible seats that I want to wire up (also have to fabricate the seat mounts).

BG

You may have checked this, but remember that usually during cranking the power arrives at the ECU and to the coil + via a different route than in run. It could be that there's a bad connection there so you have trouble only in START and a good connection in RUN.

You could test that by putting the ignition in RUN and use a jumper wire to turn on the starter relay (a test light ought to show power at one of the small connections at the starter relay that goes to the + coil, the other ought to energize the relay).

Alternatively, disconnect the starter relay to starter cable (just for safety), then measure the voltage at the (+) coil and at the ECU in in RUN and START. For a factory setup, the + coil ought to be 6-8V in RUN and about 12V in START (for a stronger spark). The ECU ought to get about 12V for both RUN and START.

If you don't get 12V in START, the starter relay or its connections are suspect.