I now have no spark. The MSD and coil check out fine. They throw a big fat spark when the trigger wire is grounded and ungrounded. But I get no spark at all out of the plugs. Is it possible to check the magnetic pick up in some way. It is an old two pick up unit a traded from Reed. Can these things go bad, and how do I know? I surely hope it is the pickup, and not the Accel ECM. WHat models had this distributor if i need to pick up another set of reluctors and pickup sets? Is it possible to put a single set in this distibutor? The bases look completely different. Thanks. Sam

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Is the rotor on the work bench?

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Yeah....Im the one who destroyed this rare, vintage automobile.....

you can pull the distributor and put a multimeter in the "plug" and roll the tooth by the pickup it goes from something like 150 ohms to 750(? I think) and back...

The reluctor is the same 1973-up...the pick up is like 197 something and up...I think you can retrofit a single pickup back into it, but you will have to realign the distributor to the engine again.

-D.Idiot

Electrically the pickup should have a few hundred ohms resistance across the leads and both leads should be electrically isolated from the distributor body. The NOS distributor that just arrived today was 287 ohms acros the pickup coil and would put out 1.5 VAC when giving the distributor a quick spin with the fingers.

Does the ECM recognize that the engine is cranking? There is a Calmap screen to view this no?

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Joshua

This is going to be a long post, so thanks in advance for anyone who reads it. Sandy,it acts like the rotor is on the bench, but it is in there where it belongs. I am really hoping this is just the most basic stuff going wrong right now. I have not pulled the coil lead and checked it to see if there is spark there. I will do that in the morning. DI the distributor is way off now, so pulling it is no big deal, if I have to do that..

I have two challenges: this engine is too tight to turn by hand, so I must make a remote crank switch to bump the engine around, so I can check the alignment of the rotor with number one. I think I might be way off here. If I get spark out of the coil, then I am certain of it. My plan is to take an old cap and cut off the tower for number one so I can see down in there. Because of all the turbo junk, and wiring harnesses, I prefer not to take off the valve cover, which I used to do to find number one TDC . So I guess I will pull number one plug and see if I can feel the compression to find the compression stroke on number one. Do you think that is reliable enough?

So the second thing I do not understand is the logic when setting up the timing with Accel. I don;t know how the "crank off-set dgrees" effects the actual timing. Also, according to Rance, it is impossible to wire the reluctor pickup into the accel harness with absolute certaintly as to it's polarity without trying it. Apparently, if you wire the two pick up wires backwards, the timinng retards when you rev it, instead of advancing. The fix is just to reverse the two wires from the reluctor. He says there is nothing universal about the polarity of the wiring on URI type ignitions. But I cannot check this until it at least starts again. So that compounds the issues here.

I just do not understand how all of this dove tails, and how to get it untangled. I am going to treat it for now as a brand new install, and start over, because I have really lost my way. The things is, when i still had the MEga Squirt on it, I dynamic timed it,while running, at 20 degrees advanced, which is what the book said to do. That gave me a good base line. Because I could not rotate the distributor far enough then to get the timing light syncronized with the ECM's timing readout, I had to pull the distributor, and then my base line was lost. I now have the unslotted hold down clamp in place, so if i can get back to square one, I can move the distributor enough to get it syncronized. But I no longer have the option of starting it up with the MEga Squirt in place and dynamic timing it.

If I do not get spark out of the coil while cranking , then there are several other possibilities, one is the reluctor, the other is perhaps a tuning issue that I have overlooked on the calmap. This thing is keeping me awake. That is why I am here in front of the computer in the middle of the night.
Anybody have a BBD two barrel set up they want to swap for a turbo DFI set up? Sam

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Sam,

Your doing too many things at once. Get the accel computer going in fuel only - standard EI 6 tooth reluctor trigger distributor, the msd box (or mopar box, or hei box) and go. Get the car driveable. Then once thats set get into computer controlled timing. Your going to be chasing your tail otherwise.

For finding tdc with valve cover on - I take the #1 plug out, stick a finger in the hole, and jerk the engine over little by little with starter switch until you feel compression. Keep going until the mark on dampner gets closer and closer to 0, and once its on it, your at tdc. You will feel compression on your finger well before the mark is close to zero. You should be able to turn engine over by hand with pulley bolt even with plugs in, unles your running monsterous compression. Otherwise, either something is wrong or you need a longer wrench. I'm able to turn over new engine by hand with plugs in and a crescent about a foot or so long.

EFI is frustrating at first but worth it in the end. No pain no gain....

Thanks to everyone up till now! If I can find a logical way to focus on one thing at a time, I will, but first I have to get spark. Here is where I am at this point. I have timed the distributor visually with the aforementioned distributor cap with the hole cut in it. It should be close enough to TDC on number one to start. I have checked the pickup coil, and it registeres 300 ohms on my digital VOM. I have the gap adjusted with a file card, which measures .010". Things should be close enough that there is spark at the plug wire towers, but it will not start.

When I first started it up Saturday evening, , it fired right off, and ran, even though it was very rich. Everything started going to hell when I selected the initial configuration option, of "default 2 bar map sensor". At that point the car started running badly, so something changed, and got worse and worse until it just stopped. I am not sure it is anything I did. I was just trying to follow the set up instructions. I went in and specified all kinds of things which are specific to this engine, but nothing seemed to make it any better. .
Is it possible that this reluctor is bad even though it passes the tests Josh and DI suggested?

I don;t have a bolt on the balancer of this engine. I have to pull it over with the belts. I can move it with the belts. , but it is hard. It is not high compression, only 8.5:1 but it is very tight, and good compression. Plus, I'm not as young as I used to be. I do have a bolt that would fit the front. I used it to put the balancer back on. Maybe I should go ahead and run it in there and tighten it up.
Sam

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Acceptable ohm range is 150-900 ohms.

Specs vary a little by year for pickup-reluctor air-gap, especially on the dual pickup distributors. The most common spec for a single pickup dist is .008". But I have seen it range from .006" to .012" on dual pickups. IIRC, the spec for my original ESA dist in my '87 was .008" for the run pickup and .012" for the start pickup (I might have those backwards).

IMO if you are set at .010" that should be close enough to trigger a spark.

-S/6

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The "Silver Bullet"
87 Ram D150