this is the first time it's crapped out, the demon. I had just got off the highway and was sitting at a red light. It suddenly dropped to about 250 rpm and sputtered and died. I tried to start it up but it just cranked and wouldn't fire. I got it to a safe side street (where I am now) and checked it out. I have fuel at the filter and in the carb, but there's a lot of mist coming from the carb. It cranks like a champ but won't start. There's like a distant sputter I can hear, but no start. I checked the coil maybe 15 minutes later, and it's still hot. Overheating coil maybe? Any other thoughts?

Could be the ballast,ign box and I'd suspect the coil last. Good luck with it.

If you can see gas going into carb when you throttle, it probably isn't vapor lock....Although, if it starts after sitting for 30-45 min, I would check routing of your fuel line around the block/exhaust.. Do you have points or Pertronix....???

Alright, I'm safely at work via my MINI, and now I can update a little better. I got AAA to tow, so to the people who will say something about me calling towing first, I did.

There was definitely fuel dripping into the carb venturi, and the carb itself was cold, if you can believe it. So there was no vapor lock from the carb itself, either

I will check ballast first I think. I have an extra one, but what's weird is that the entire ignition system (MP electronic) has maybe 4 hours of driving time on it.

The other weird thing was that if I cranked for about ten seconds, you'd hear a rumble like it really wanted to start. I even got it to start once, but it was at really low RPM. I tried to hold it up by pressing the throttle lever on the carb, and it did something of interest - whenever I left it at idle, it ran (albeit rough), but whenever I pushed the throttle lever back, it would stop combustion.

I just hope I didn't wipe a lobe on the cam

A couple of things to test..

1. A qwikee test of the ballast resistor is just jump it for a very short time..

2. Check the reluctor inside the distributor, sometime the gap is too wide. Works inconsistently, regap it and see what happens.

Just my $0.025...

Check for spark before worrying about the individual components.

If you have spark and fuel, it sounds mechanical. How old are the timing chain/gears?

Okay, that's better. As I said, check for a good spark first.
The three things you need are air/fuel (you say the carb is not hot and there is fuel coming out), spark (there is good stuff on electronic ignitions in the tech section), and compression.
Since the motor is fresh, we will assume at this point that the rings and timing are okay. The part that worries me is the slowing down before dying. That's usually not a sign of an electrical issue, although it can happen. Did the engine get hot, did the oil pressure drop?
When you can check for spark, let us know.

Oil pressure seemed to drop , but I don't know whether that was a consequence of the oil pump not spinning fast enough or whether it was a factor in why it was dying. When I hold the starter for ten seconds, it does have a bit of pressure on the gauge (10lbs maybe?) but it doesn't build to like 40-50lbs. But that doesn't mean much to me - when we started the motor for the first time, it didn't show oil pressure building, but when it's on, it's had 75lbs cold and 40-50lbs hot like clockwork.

The engine didn't get that warm overall, and never overheated before this happened.

I am going to check for spark and change the oil tonight.

Do you have a chrome coil? and is it mounted on the intake manifold?

Same thing happened to me and it was the chrome coil that gave out. it was really hot, and I understand the chrome ones tend to hold in the heat.
I don't use the chrome ones anymore. I always carry spare resistors, ECU, and a coil along with a bag of tools of course.

I had a similar problem recently and it was the coil.

Hey Brian - I just saw this thread. As sort of already stated before:

a. Immediate diagnosis is checking for fuel and spark. If not present, or in insufficient quantity/quality, chase those things.

b. IFF (obscure nerdy acronym, not a typo) all the stuff in a. pans out, THEN worry about the scary stuff (timing chain, cam lobes, etc) and dig deeper with a compression test.

The coil is a Pertronix epoxy-filled coil. Also new. I was told it would work as it's mounted sideways and on the intake manifold. Maybe it's getting too hot. Am I correct in thinking that if it was the coil overheating, I should be able to go home and it will have spark and start, right?

If I go home and don't have spark, I guess I could get the coil checked and then look into everything else.

Steve, I am positive I have fuel. I have fuel dripping from the boosters when I open the butterflies. I am however not positive I have spark, so that's what I will check first.

Thanks everyone!

I don't know about the rest of you guys, but I'm mostly impressed that though Sharpie's 20th century technology ridin relic broke down, this guy's using up to the minute 21st century technology (Laptop?), and is posting to us members From The Side Of The Road!

Kudos!

but what else would he have to do waitin on the tow truck?

bet he used a cell phone to call AAA

or did you send them an e mail?

I am with you there sharpie,butterflys all in the stomich over what all could be bad wrong..

thats a very short run time for a prob to show up

good luck and keep us posted



scratchin

A couple other things to check. You mentioned "mist coming from the carb" and "fuel dripping from the venturi".

Check the float operation on your carb. A stuck or misadjusted float can result in raw gas being dumped in the engine and killing it. This is flooding at an extreme and can make restarting very hard for a long period of time.

My brother once flooded his engine with a bad carb. Replace the carb and it would barely run. Ended up the plugs were too gas fouled to start, even a couple days later. New plugs and the problem was gone.

I'll check the carb, though I am pretty sure it's alright. The floats got adjusted a couple weeks ago to where it should be. Further, this was so sudden that it began to die that unless they happened to just suddenly misalign, it wouldn't seem like a float problem.

But I will definitely check everything.

Now, I'm almost certain it's the coil. You have to use their proprietary coil with the Ignitor I and II or -- if you're using another brand of coil -- to have a resistor in line. Do you have the rest of the Pertronix set up installed ?