Projects Cutting my Hotrod Teeth (57 Chevy Budget build/revival)

I remember my first (and only) carb rebuild when I was a youngin, I put it on, tried to start it and nearly burnt my 64 valiant when it flooded over and backfired....... after I got the fire beat out, I made a used one work off something else and it ran fine, mission accomplished, well kind of

 

Best advice I got when I was starting out, " If your going to ask a question...... listen to the answer." I have always learned more listening than talking ( or in the modern world typing ). Again, good luck with your project and patience.

 

This is how I do it. Once I hear it pop than I know I have ignition. Then you start looking to clean the fuel lines , change the points, plugs and wires and start to settle it in.

 

Well, i put everything back together, and learned that i hate 235 intake bolts. Other than that, i did spray some starting spray in it, cranked it and nothing. As soon as my rebuild kit gets here i'll do that but for the time being theres not much to do starting wise. I'm kind of surprised the fuel lines are all metal, no flex hosing.


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Good for you. If you didn't get a pop than you have no spark. Now is the time to look at your coil and other ignition components. this stuff is pretty easy once you understand it.

Thanks for staying with it.

 

Yeah, i'm going to take a look at the coil tomorrow, it looks pretty bad anyway, and i'll check the distributer too but i had it open when i bought it, everything looked really clean but i guess you never know


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You can take a plug out, stick it back in the wire, touch the side of the plug to engine to ground it,have some one crank the engine and see if it sparks, sometime you can see spark if its just laying on top of engine and looking at it while cranking.........or if you are brave enough you can stick a screw driver up in the plug wire where plug is suppose to attach and crank it while holding metal part of screw driver and having yourself touching car for a ground, It will give you a jolt but you will know its firing at least some This car shouldnt hurt you too bad (Ive done it) but some cars are powerful enough to hurt you, so "try at your own risk on this one". I had a family member light me up with a lawn mower plug once back before I knew any better

 

Did you take your distributor cap and rotary button off and run a piece of sand paper between your points yet?

 

I tested for spark and 100% do not have any, i'll look at the points/coil tomorrow. I was doing little stuff since i'm at a stand still in the middle of the night and i ended up snapping the dry rotted front turn signal connector. For some reason i cant get the bulb out. At this point if i touch anything on this car i fully expect it to be brittle and just crack immediately.


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Sanded the points and cranked it with the distributor cap off. Here's a couple videos, its hard to do this kinda thing when i dont have a helper. I dont even think the point is moving let alone making spark...

 

Can you get in closer, my old eyes can't see the actual points,just the rotor
Edit: Why don't you go ahead and set the points right now just to make sure they are right. Turn the engine by hand using a socket and handle on the crank pully until the fiber rubbing block on the points is stopped exactly on the high point of the dist. cam lobe. chech the gap between the 2 sides of the points using a feeler gauge if you have one at .018 thousanths or in a pinch use the cover of a paper match book. You adjust by loosening the 1 screw holding the side of the point set that's away from the rotor [should see a slot to allow the set to move] I'm assuming this set is in reasonable shape, if not then I guess you might as well replace them. Good Luck. Ralphie

 

He probably has his phone propped up on the fender and has to use the key to turn the engine over. He mentioned he is working by himself.

 

If you don't see the points opening, most likely they are not, so adjust them until they do, will be good practice for when you get a new set to install.

The insulated wire going through the housing takes some care to get off, I took a deep 7/16th socket and made kinda like a spanner wrench, to get the nut off, I'll see if I can find a pic on the web of the tool, so you can see what I mean.

Here's one, Snap On number is TMC 43

https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/vintage-snap-tmc43-tmc-43-specialty-128377097

 

Well i guess it's either the condenser or the coil


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You might try running a wire straight from the battery to the coil to make sure you have voltage to the coil. The problem could be a loose or bad connection somewhere between the ignition switch and coil. Or at least check for voltage at the coil with a meter or test light. Assume nothing and check the basics that cost nothing before throwing money at problems and you will succeed!

 

If it were a loose connection between the switch and coil it wouldn't even turn over though right?

 

If you are going to work alone you might want to invest in remote start switch. They are pretty cheap. They hook up to the battery and starter with alligator clips so you don't have to be turning the key and not seeing what your doing. Pretty sure I bought mine at Sears 30 years ago and it still works fine.

 

Not necessarily. The starter will turn the motor over but you may have a short in the wire going to the coil and not getting voltage there.

Wire and alligator clips are your friend.

 

Hmm. Okay good info. I pulled the coil off, and i have a multimeter. Does it matter what setting my multimeter is on? And what should i get as a test


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Well i'm about to head back to school, disappointed i didnt get anything done this weekend. Still no spark. Tried to crank it and i guess the clutch wasnt engaged all the way and the car lurched forward a few feet and the starter is not happy about that, hopefully i didnt just mess up my starter as well


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Well i'm about to head back to school, disappointed i didnt get anything done this weekend. Still no spark. Tried to crank it and i guess the clutch wasnt engaged all the way and the car lurched forward a few feet and the starter is not happy about that, hopefully i didnt just mess up my starter as well


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Did you run a wire from the battery direct to the coil as was suggested??? I doubt you did anything to the starter. The coil might be good.

 

When you say a wire from the battery to the coil, what wire are we talking about? And where am i connecting this wire? Which terminals of the battery, which part of the coil? And what would i be looking for?

 

Positive from the battery to the positive side of the coil.

 

Might have found part of the problem. I took the really dry rotted wire that runs from the starter to the coil and found this... it was covered in electrical tape but i think it's time to just get a new piece of wire...

 

This would be a great time to see if you can get a fellow HAMBr over next weekend to help you out, many of us know that set up like the back of our hand, 30 minutes with an experienced person could save you a weekend of guessing.

 

Now look at that. That is exactly what we are talking about. Now I have seen wires like that conduct current so it still doesn't eliminate a bad coil or condenser. You need to run a clean wire from the battery positive to the coil positive. You will see + signs that designate positive from negative -.

 

There should not be a wire running directly from the starter to the coil if it's original. the + side of the coil should come from the ignition sw. Also put the trans in Neutral and block both sides of arear wheel. You don't need to hold the clutch in!! Now if you want to try as in post#114 connect a temporary wire to coil.

 

I'm no longer at home so i can't go check, but if i remember right, when i took that cruddy wire off, it ran from the solenoid to the coil, but i didnt look that close because as soon as i saw how messed up the wire is i knew i was just going to take it out anyway and replace it

 

Probably did, Im not a real good wiring guru, but I did have to run a wire from my solenoid to the coil on a couple old 55s I did a engine swap on, It was something where I wasnt getting fire to the coil while it was cranking over but the second I let off the key to run position it would fire up, The wire from the starter to the coil let it get fire all the time and be able to shut the engine off too.
(the wire you took off isnt pretty but probably worked ok)
As mentioned You can temporarily run a wire from the positive side of the battery to the positive side of the coil to see if it will fire or start but you wont be able to shut it off unless you disconnect that temporary wire.

You probably are but I would recommend taking pics of everything you take off for reference later.