hi, while driving along in my 68 dart, it never missed a lick, then it like coughed then took off then died..

after a few cranks it started and i drove home where it died again in my drive.

well i found out im not getting any fire..

so i figued a wire (electronic conversion) came loose or something.. well nothing looks loose all connections are soldered in.

so after swaping everything from the sun, I decided to swap out dist.. I used my 410 stroker (non vac advance dist) and it fired right up..

humm so i swaped in the reman one and nothing..

so off to advance i go, i exchange the dist, installed it and it started, now i have a stumble and a miss. just doesnt soud like it did before the problem started..

could the reman dist still cause this? I checked the gap in the pick up coil. i set it from .008 to .0010 and that didnt make it better or worse..

I swappped caps, coils, rotors.. ect... now im off to pull the plugs.. but i cant see why they would miss now when it didnt miss before the pickup coil went bad..

well i pulled out the re-man dist from advance, and replace it with my FBO dist (mech advance) and it runs like it did before all this began.. well off to to the store to exchange it with another i guess..
I guess this re-man dist was built on friday

Did you adjust the reluctor gap?

yes i adjusted it, when I got the second dist, the gap was way off and crooked, so i re-adjusted it.. ran like crap.. so then i installed a good dist (FBO) and the car runs fine except there is no vac advance..but advance said they would swap it out again..

Grr i swapped the dist out for another one, and it does the same thing, but when i install the MP (FBO modified) dist the car runs fine.. and to find out the Cardone brand re-man dist used the old pick up coil.. so thats 3 dist, first one just crapped out, the 2nd ones do about the same thing, the MP dist runs good no miss or stubbles at all..

is there a way to test the PU coils? I found out Cardone doesnt replace the PU coil.. it just tests it ect..

anyone have a good dist?

I don't know, but it sounds to me like the distributor might not be the problem. Is there anything in the two ? (three?) "bad" ones that are common, like cap, rotor?

Have you rechecked with the "good" one?

if i leave everything the same.. and install the MP (fbo)dist it will run good no miss or sputter, if i swap out the cardone re-man it will miss backfire ect..(timming the same) according to cardone the reman uses used (tested) PU coils and springs.. the only thing I have not swapped is the cap.. but its not that old (blue streak)..I would think if i had a bad componet it would miss/backfire with either dist.. but for the heck of it when I installed the 3rd cardone dist and it didnt run well, i replaced everything, coil, ballast, ecu (the wires are new blue streak..) still ran like crap, then I swapped the cardone dist for the MP dist and it ran just fine.. so that leads me to beleive its the dist still

The one difference between the FBO distributor and the rebuilts are the rebuilt ones will have a lot more timing in them than the FBO. Do sets up the his FBO distributors to use a lot of initial advance and reduces the mechanical a lot. If you are installing a factory rebuilt and setting the intitial to the same amount as you use with the FBO then you will have well over 40 degrees total timing at higher rpms. This could be causing the crappy perfromance.

yes that is strange that(3) in a row would be bad

actully i am setting the intial on both dist the same, 2.5 Degrees

Note:
Before top dead center
*Set at warm idle speed (600 RPM)
*Distributor vacuum hose disconnected & plugged
*Transmission in neutral (parking brake engaged)
*All accessories off

if I change nothing and just swap the dist only and use the same cap, plugs wires ect.., then both dist should act the same (no miss or back fires) but they do not..

if it was some other component falilure then it should act up with either dist (run the same, miss and backfire)

I have tried 3 ecus, 3 coils, 2 ballast.

I called Cardone they said they have had problems before ect.. but usally not 2 in a row.. they did say they test all the used PU coils to insure they work correctly..i wonnder if the advance mech isnt working correctly , like advancing the timming to far out??

off to work on her again ..

there is 2 notches in the reluctor for phasing. check to see that it's in the right one. that would make it run pretty bad if it's not.

When you 1st posted I was thinking that the (3) went bad one right after another as you put em in & I was thinking that maybe the pickup plug in (dist to ECU) was reversed but from your last post that is not the case. This is quite a whodunit. Keep us updated I'm anxious to see what it ends up being.

Check your rotor phasing by cutting a hole in the old cap.

See: http://forums.off-road.com/jeep-short-wheelbase/122916-rotor-phasing-basic-how-explained.html

mine was fine... but this is what people are talking about and how to measure.

hi
i just went through this with my 75 dart -318 .

car will start instantly most of the time but ocassionaly would refuse to start till you tried neumorus times then suddenly it would start instantly agin .
seamed to run fine till i reved engine to app 3500 in netrual then i would feel a roughness.
drove me nuts till for 2 mounths !
i tested the pick up during a no start phase . found it was bad .
removed it installed another problem solved and reves past 3500 smooth now .
retested old pick up agin and it read good agin till i taped it lightly and then bad aginn . so it worked intermitantly .
tested them with ohm meter got a reading of 2.6 to 4.25 on good ones , 0 on bad one when it would throw a fit !
hope this helps

here is a pics of my rotor..

The rotor to pickup clearance looks too wide in the pic.

how can you tell that when the reluctor isnt lined up??

how do i know which hole its should go in, guess i could just swap the reluctor around since in only has two phasing holes..