alright fellas here's your chance to shine...............been havin' a problem with my 80 vette just losing electrical power and shutting down right in the middle of a cruise...but usually it will start again..sometimes right away and sometimes after it cranks for a little while..well today it died at a red light and i haven't been able to restart it..it cranks over just fine and it is getting plenty of gas..I thought it might be the coil so I replaced it but still no go....give me some advice............PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!

 

Is it electronic or points? Had the same sort of thing happen and it was a loose conection on the points. Good luck with it.

 

Check for spark at the plugs.
In an extreme case, the bearings go out in the dist. Had this happen to a Blazer once. Same symtoms you have. Pull the cap and check for any dist. shaft wobble. Well, that's my guess.

 

Check your bat cables and connections. I had a similar problem and it was where the neg bat cable bolted to the frame.

 

A bad battery connection would cause it not to crank. Since it does crank, look elsewhere. It's got to be in the ignition circuit. Now in the "old"Chevys, there was a resistor on the firewall. If that sucker went out, no power to the coil. Ya might test to see if ya have juice goin' to the coil. If so, test coil wire to center of dist., then check for spark to the plugs from the dist. If it goes in, but don't come out, that's the one that's bad. If it goes in, but don't come out of the dist, start diggin' there.

 

well I got her home, finally..........I think the problem is in the ignition harness.. I jumped a wire straight from the battery to the coil and she fired right up...When I got her home i disconnected the lead and was dinking around with the power wire to the coil and she would fire as long as the key was held in the start position but as soon as i let the key go she would die..I also noticed that my stereo is not turning on, this tells me that I'm not getting power to it and that is also controlled by the ignition switch( when it is in the on or accessory position)..A friend of mine suggested that i look at the connection for the ignition switch down at the bottom of the steering column...He said he had the same type of problem on his Trans Am and he found the rods in the column had pushed the harness loose...I'll keep you posted.....Thaks for everyones suggestions, by the way it is HEI ................Put a Pete Jackson gaer drive in her a couple of weeks ago and I just love the sound of that gear whine( advanced the stock cam 2degrees and it really woke it up!)........................

 

Hey Starship,
I had a short or bad ground connectionin my neg bat cable where it is bolted to the frame.
Sometimes it would alow the engine to crank and sometimes it would not.
It finally gave up and it would not crank at all.

 

Alright headhunter, here's my 2 cents. The main power to the whole car goes to a terminal on the starter solenoid before it continues on up to the firewall harness, also the ignition gets a separate power lead from the solenoid alongside the power for the rest of the car. Near the solenoid on each of these wires you will find a section about 3/4 of a inch that looks like a rubber connector, this is a fusible link within the wire, if the link for the ignition is broken internally you wont have spark unless your cranking the engine. I would check the fusible links first and then make sure the rest of the terminals are clean and tight. If these check out alright and you still have intermittent ignition failure then I would suspect the pickup coil or the ignition control module both of which are located in the distributor. These can make and break relative to heat.

 

Hi headhnter61, I agree with 78buckshot, when you turn the key to "Start" you get full battery voltage to the coil, then when you release the key to "Run" the electric goes thru a resistor wire.
There are two wires on the coil, the resistor wire is black and says 135 ohm in pink. That is the broken connection that 78buckshot mentioned. The cloth sleeved wire runs from the starter and gives you full battery voltage at start. Don't leave the jumper connected to long or you will kill the module.
What year is your car?
What is a Pete Jackson gear and what's so good about it? PG

 

Hey Schoon,
Since he has cranking ability and no start, that's why I say that it wouldn't be the bat cable. Quote: " ..it cranks over just fine and it is getting plenty of gas.."
But ya, if it had intermittent cranking, you would check the bat cables.

Buckshot is right, check for juice at the coil/dist. If that fusible link is broken, you won't get any juice at the coil/dist.. By checking up top, you won't have to get under the carunless you don't get juice at the coil/dist.If you do get juice up top, the prob is in the dist. ( modual most likely )