A friend of mine just bought a '63 Mercury Meteor wagon with a V-8. I'm trying to talk him thru getting it started over the phone (yeah, fun). He has replaced the cap, rotor, condensor, plug wires, and coil and he still has no spark. He does not have power to the coil. Last I talked to him, I told him to check to see if the rotor is actually turning and if it was to put a 12V jumper to the coil to see if he can get spark that way. He sent me a couple of pictures of a box that is on the firewall that he claims is where the power for the coil comes from. Remember that I'm doing this over the phone so it's really tough for me to know exactly what is what. So does anybody know what this thing is and what it is called so he can buy a new one? This one has obviously seens it day. Here's a shot of where it sits on the firewall and the wires that are attached to it.
it's a relay, not sure what it's for, but probably a power robbing accessory, such as power windows or something.
It's the kickdown relay for an overdrive transmission. Theres's also a little switch under the gas pedal that when fully depressed, is supposed to,activate that relay & cut off power to the ignition for a second while simultaniously disengageing the overdrive solenoid allowing you to pass another vehicle or to push the O/D lever in, to take it out of overdrive. Anyway. the relay is makes most of that happen. Billy
So if he connected those two dangling wires together, he should have power. No? Just eliminating a relay.. I thought those were for the power windows. Never seen an OD relay. Not that you are wrong, just never saw one before.
Cool, thanks guys. So would it be advisable to find a replacement (if so, where?) or eliminate it and rewire?
Well, it appears that shoebox72's answer about it being a kickdown relay is correct. The car does have overdrive and there is a switch under the gas pedal that has wires running to this device. Now we just need to figure out what to do about it.
What to do.. The device is a 12 vdc relay and fuse assembly, that probably gets it's negative from the metal mount. What is probably supposed to happen is when you step on the pedal switch the switched wire from the pedal switch will either turn on 12 vdc to the relay assembly or turn off the 12 vdc to the relay assembly. This will cause the relay to snap open or closed like a telegraph key. How strong the contact needs to be in amps will determine the relay to get. What you are switching and why I have to leave to others, like does the contact break negative to a circuit tied hot by the relay's 12 vdc switching wire etc. I'll watch the post.
Can you handle a meter? get me a picture of the assembly from the top maybe also with cover off is one old one new or nos? I'll really really watch the thread.
Here is a typical diagram for a Borg Warner trans. The color of your wires may be different but this is the general idea. The switch under the gas pedal is there to knock the trans out of overdrive when you floor it for passing.
Wow! Great schematic! What I would do is disconnect that wire on the distributor side of the coil. The one that goes to the Rube Goldberg solution there. Yea, that one. Disconnect that bad boy, and see if spark is restored.
HA! Thanks Tommy. I dug out some old manuals & was just about to scan the same diagram to post here. Billy
Ahh, beautiful, thanks Tommy. recardo, thanks for the advise. Armed with this info, we'll see where we can get with it. Thanks again guys.
Remove the porcelain Ignition resistor from the firewall check for continuity/and see if it has burned itself into on it's rear side.......kind of a common problem.....
The wire coming from the relay to the coil is not a 12V feed. When you floor it, that wire actually momentarily grounds the points which kills the engine for a split second taking the pressure off the gears so that it can shift out of OD for passing. It may be possible that the contacts are stuck or the wire is grounding out along it's path. Remove that wire from the coil to eliminate any funny stuff from the relay. You can always reconnect it later if you restore the OD function
Gov. supplies neg. to the relay. Relay switch's Pos. to the O.D. Solonoid. Kickdown switch disables relay takes hot away from O.D. Solonoid. Internal O.D. Solonoid contact supplies neg. to the coil to disable ignition I guess to let it slip out, and once the solonoid releases the neg. is removed, which is why you can hold it floored and it continues to run. That's the theory I see I'll check back..
If the wire colors match the print or look like they should I can walk you thru identification and hook up if you can do or direct some meter tests
Alright, here's what we have so far. All of the wiring is intact to that mess of a solenoid. I had him remove the wire that runs from the distributor side of the coil down to the kickdown switch. This should isolate the ignition system from that whole overdrive circuit, right? Right! He still has no fire. I had him check the ignition side of the coil for power with the key on and while cranking. Power was good to that point. (By the way, he did install a new coil and condensor. Not that they couldn't be bad, but....) He also checked that the rotor is actually turning and that his new distributor cap has all of it bits in place. That's where we left it for tonight. I instructed him to start back at the basics and get the motor up on top dead center (#1) and check the position of the distributor and the routing of the plug wires. I told him to turn the motor over until the points are closed, turn on the ignition and push open the points to see if he has power there. I also told him to trace the wire from the condensor to the coil looking for breaks in the wire. Did I miss anything?
Does he have a good ground, one from the motor to the body, and did he install the wires on the correct sides of the coil? You should be able to run a wire from the battery + to the coil and jump it at the starter solenoid to crank it. It should start. Make sure its in neutral or park. It will drive away from you. Or over you. verify the points do open.
I'm leaning towards the ground, as suggested. Measure the resistance from the distributor housing to the negative battery post (sorry, I'm assuming Fords were negative ground by then). Should be real low. It wouldn't hurt to replace the ground strap from the engine to the frame. I'd also check the coil HV cable. Make sure it is built correctly on both ends. Cut it off and re-do it if in doubt.
It is threads and info like this that make the HAMB such a great place.Everyday you can learn something new. Maybe it's stuff you didn't want to learn but you can get educated anyway. God I love this place........
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