I had just lubricated the distributor yesterday, put it back together the same way. It started up today and I started driving out of my neighborhood when suddenly at a stop the engine died. It turned back on again but at the next stop the car died a second time and it wouldn't start after that. Was close enough to home that some neighbors and myself with the wife steering were able to push it back home. It wouldn't push start either. A lot of people stopped to offer help.

Pretty sure I screwed something up with the distributor. I'm about to go back out to find what the heck I screwed up, If you have ideas why this would happen, I'd appreciate hearing it. Also, a couple days before I cleaned out the carb, but it ran really well after doing that, so I don't think its the carb that's at fault but I don't know enough to rule it out.

Chris, the most likely things are that you put the rotor arm back on slightly "squint". Or the cap might be misaligned with the locator, the HT leads loose or you might even have knocked off the LT lead as these are sometimes in a fragile state. Possibly some grease or oil is in the wrong place and has upset the contacts.

My guess is the first one; the arm can be quite tight to fit. You need to rotate it slightly when fitting to be sure it clicks in the right place. With a bit of luck, if this is the case, the items won't be cracked.

Recheck the points gap as well.

Chris

I think I have the same problem, any luck on finding out what happened?

Go back to basics. Take the spark plugs out of number one cylinder, the one nearest to you from the back of the car and still connected to the HT lead rest it on the engine block so that the outside is touching metal but don't hold onto it or you will know about it.

Rotate the engine around by turning the nut on the end of the alternator or dynamo around with a spanner. Make sure the ignition is on and see if you get a spark on the spark plug? Make sure you turn the ignition off or you will cook the coil.

If no spark take the distributor cap off and again rotate the engine around using the same method as before and see if you have a spark at the points as they open and close. In your case Chris you may need to remove the distributor arm as you have the big one that covers the points so you can't see them but even so you should hear a nice crisp spark. Again with ignition on but again switch it off at the end.

Tony

Did the spark plug test as instructed. No spark.

What exactly does the wick do? Is that part of the ignition circuit conducting electricity down from the coil?

Is the wick supposed to touch the underside middle contact of the rotor arm? (as shown in first pic), because the wick is pushed down a ways in the middle and I don't think its touching anything.

Also, I tried giving the rotor a bit of a rotate as Peter suggested when reattaching to ensure it clicks down. Yes it does go down into the correct position. I had removed the arm and put a drop of oil on the wick, and clean/lubed the carbon brush.

The wick is simply there to hold a bit of lubricating oil at the shaft so won't be the problem.
There seems to be a lot of oil/grease around the contacts which may stop the spark crossing them. How did you lube the carbon bush? Do the points open when the distributor is rotated - the gap may have closed?

Chris as Andy says it looks really oily inside the distributor and the rotor arm. See if you can clean it up a bit especially inside the rotor arm where it clicks onto the top of the distributor there is a little metal plate that needs to be nice and clean to provide contact to the distributor. Also on the top of the rotor arm where the carbon brush inside the cap touches needs to be nice and clean and inside the cap itself.

Try the second part of the test to see if you are getting a spark at the points? You can unbolt the distributor and rotate it by hand with the ignition on, to open and close the points but I don't want you to screw up the timing as I get the impression that you wouldn't be comfortable\confident enough at the moment to reset it correctly?

Tony

Gents, sorry to hijack the thread somewhat, but I'm having a tad of trouble retiming my engine - It just will not run just pops and backfires through the carb and exhaust. The plug gap is good, the points gap is good and I'm using the Haynes method of resetting the job, as there is no previous indicator marking of old timing. I have the Marelli S152A electronic dizzy with no rotor arm. I am simply replacing parts removed during the upgrade, no damage has been done and the car ran well before???? HELP!!!

Ian.

It sounds like you have the timing 180° out.

That's what I was going to say. I did the same thing when I first got the car

Vitesse said:

It sounds like you have the timing 180° out.

Click to expand...

Scrap that idea Ian, I remember now you have a wasted spark setup so it can't be that. It sounds like the timing is way out though. I would rotate the distributor one way and then the other whilst someone tries to start the car and see if it will fire.

Tony

Thanks Tony, I had a funny feeling that I would have to do something like you suggest - I don't think this has anything to do with the panda head and subsequent tuning??? But, as the panda turns the other way round I'm not too sure???? Just shows you that following the 'Haynes route ' is not always the best way!!!!

Ian.

I am a bit afraid to mess with the timing but I guess I'll have to confront that regardless.

Okay so I opened the distributor back up and scraped off all the carbon buildup on the 2 contacts on the cap. I also opened the points and scraped the contacts, they were fogged up with carbon buildup. Now the contacts are all scratched up but I was running out of ideas. I also gave the arm and shaft and everywhere else a decent cleanup with WD40 and Q-tips.

The cleaning alone wasn't enough, but after scraping off the carbon the engine roared back up immediately, however it does not last when idling. It will eventually start to skip beats and then stall, and eventually not start. But then I open the distributor back up, scrape the breaker points more, and it will start again a couple more times..

I'm guessing I should order new points, cap, arm, and cables... and maybe a coil while I'm at it (already got a new condenser on it). But since I'm doing this, do you think it is worthwhile to invest in something like an electronic ignition conversion kit? Or is that excessive.

Also, based on the 2 pictures I had shown, is it possible to gather if the distributor is a Marelli?

Chris it's good to have found the cause of the problem and a fundamental part of owning a 500 is to learn how to do the ignition timing, it is really essential, once you have done it a few times it will become second nature.

Electronic ignition has been debated loads of times on this forum and the pros and cons of it, just do a quick search.

Do you know what I what I would do if I were you. I would buy all the new ignition components you need at the moment so points, HT leads, cap, etc. So that you can set yourself the task of installing them and getting the car running on what it was originally meant to run on. It will be a good learning exercise.

Once you have all the new bits let us know on here and we can give you a few tips before you start.

Tony

The other thing to note is that because these are two cylinder engines, one dirty or fouled spark plug has a dramatic effect on smooth running and power delivery.
Chris A.

Yeah I did put new spark plugs in there. When I went to remove the old ones, they were actually sitting lose in there. There were a couple other times where the engine seemed to stall for no reason at a stop, thinking maybe I had it in gear still, but maybe it was the distributor. All the new parts are on order now so will have to wait impatiently for them to arrive. Didn't end up going with the electronic ignition kit.

Good move Chris.

What have you ordered ignition wise?
I always recommend having your phone or camera ready at hand before you undo anything so you can cross reference before and after pictures. Do you have timing marks on the flywheel? There are sometimes just one at top dead center or two which shows 13° before TDC? It will give me and everyone a better idea to what to post as a pre op.

Tony

Along with the new condenser and spark plugs, I just ordered:

Distributor cap, arm, springs, points, HT leads, 3.3ohm coil

As far as timing goes, am I supposed to line it up like in the bottom left figure? Are those the marks you're referring to?