Hey everybody!
I had the car back together, in the same color, AND driving all at the same time for all of a few weeks!
Then I ran into a no-start issue that has persisted for the last year........
Other life priorities have been in the way, but I'm getting to the point where motivation to work on this, and my schedule, and the weather look like they'll soon be cooperating (I don't have a covered area to work). I'm hoping to solve the no-start issue this spring and, again, be able to drive her around. I realize I say that a lot on this thread.
The cycle with this car has been the following; motivation, work, drive, issue arises, park, wait (1+ years), and motivation again. Then the whole cycle repeats itself.
So here I am, brimming with motivation to run this thing through the gears and hear that little redblock sing its endearing little song. I still hope to utilize it as a (somewhat) reliable daily driver, which brings me back to the current predicament...
It first seemed like an ignition issue, so without much of any troubleshooting, I ordered a new ignition coil. When that didn't work, I surmised that it could be a fuel delivery issue. I tested that theory and discovered that the old fuel pump wasn't powering up. I replaced it with one I pulled from a JY 245. I threw in a new fuel filter also and was getting sufficient gas to the fuel rail. Still no start. Okay, let's actually dive into troubleshooting.
When checking the spark, it looked like a pretty weak spark (reddish-colored instead of blue-white) even with the new coil, spark plugs, dizzy cap, and rotor (maybe wires too? I don't remember, it's been a while). From what I've read, it looks like that could indicate a bad hall sender unit. The sourcing and replacement of one seems like a pretty intense project that could be bipassed by just replacing the whole distributor.
Does anyone have experience with this? After I reached this potential solution, I put the whole project on the backburner for a while.
After talking to a few people and reading other's threads, it seems like my issue could just be a bad wire buried somewhere in these wonderful biodegradable harnesses. I've run into this issue in the past where the starter would turn and turn without any sputtering or ignition taking place. In those cases, I found a wire here or there that had fallen out of a connector or a corrosion issue. I guess I've been trying to avoid a deeper dive into checking all of my connectors and hoping that replacing a magical component will make the car 'go' again.
Regardless, I'm getting a strong itch to drive this car and spend time wrenchin'!