Thanks guys =) Like I said if anyone is ever in west florida and needs a place to crash I've got an extra bedroom. Guess I'll rma the distrib and hope that's the problem =)

Any ideas what would be causing the ignition coil to overheat? I'm siding more with the messed up distrib, but wanted to make sure I don't actually have two problems and am missing one.

 

One thing that would cause the coil to get hot is if it had a constant 12 volts applied from the distributor (or 8 volts in the run mode)

 

Rick,
Have you disconnected the lead from the coil to the dist and grounded it to see if you get spark from the coil? If you get a spark, your problem is the dist. Just make sure you aren't standing in a puddle... Blaster coils do get warm, but should not be hot to the touch. Like Shark points out, there might be a 12v constant short that is also energizing your coil and causing your battery to drain. Do you have 12v at the coil input with the key off? As far as actually seeing damage inside the dist cap from a reverse polarity short would be pretty rare unless more than 12v hit it. The pickup is really sensitive to polarity... one way only...
Later,
Wedge
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Hmm, I have not tried that yet. I'll test it first thing tommorow morning. =) Once again thanks for all the great advice everyone.

 

I was in the Military and the people who ship household goods and vehicles do some stupid things. Make sure that you stick it to them good. Make them buy you a whole new set-up and pay you for the time you spent, all of it, working on it. Get everything new and start from scratch. Tell them that they can have the entire old set-up. Since they screwed with your car, you can get just what you want as they have no business messing with your car in that way. It's a 'Vette with a special ignition system that they should have taken care not to screw up. I'd stick it to them. You CAN get it.

 

Hi Rick, the ignition coil is probably still OK. You wont get spark at the high side of the coil with a constant 12 volts applied to the low voltage terminals. The 12 volt input needs to make and break in order to cause the coil to spark, sounds like the distributor module or pickup coil is fried.

 

Hey Rick...
Just re-read that post that I wrote... boy, my head had to be up my backside at least 3'. Sorry! I forgot my flow... pickup mod controls spark impulse... if the mod is bad, and I still feel that is the problem... no pulse to the coil. Hope my troubleshooting folly didn't cause you to waste any time.
I think I was a little distracted packing for a 4 day heli ski trip in Canada... even forgot my goggles...
Wedge
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No worries =) Hope your ski trip was a blast. I've always wanted to take a heli up a mountain and ski back down.

 

I think I'm losing my mind. I found and repaired the fusible link. (The previous bubba had used a quick connect instead of a fusible and wrapped it in electrical tape..)

I also bought a new HEI distributor/cap/coil. I wired everything and put the firing order in. Still no spark. What could be causing this? I advanced the timing a bit by rotating the distributor clockwise and I think I'm starting to go crazy.

 

Where was the fusible link that was "bubbaed" up? And did you check all the connections as dv8 suggested? PG.