I have a 210 sedan 1953 with the 235 stright 6. It will idel fine for hours but as soon as I drive it, it will die about a half a mile down the road. I feel that I have an electrical problem. The car has spark and fuel. Where should I start to look. I have platnium spark plugs in my car, should I go back to stanard plugs? Where shold I start to elmininate the problems? Any help would be greatly appricated I am young and in to classic cars and want to learn as much as I can. David Zigler Central Valley, CA
Could be a fuel pump problem or possibly a coil breaking down as it heats up? What is your ignition setup?
do you have 12v and points? if so do you have a ballast resister to drop the voltage to the points. one of the first mistakes i made years ago.
If it's original, the coil should be mounted upside down. When it's idling, the distributor does'nt move.As soon as you drive, the distributor advances, pulling the distributor wire away from the coil terminal. As soon as it returns to idle, everythings fine. You can't see it because the coil is upside down. Drove me crazy on my '57!
[qnouote=ziggycali24]Have you ever heard of polarizing a coil?[/quote] No I didn't polaroze the coil. How would I do this? David
Things to check. 1. fuel filter - 1 before, 1 after the pump. I prefer the clear kind for diagnosing problems. 2. toss the platinum plugs. good old ac plugs should be used. make dad happy. 3. watch the dizzy as you rev the motor. does it move back and forth freely? 4. You could have a vacuum leak, but with the choke on it runs fine, once the throttle opens it starves. My guess is fuel starvation.
thing about your problem. there are 3 things that make a engine run barring some major broken parts gas, spark, and air. air is usually a given. and you say you have spark and fuel. your missing something. you can isolate the elect. by disconecting the gen/alt. and solenoid wires. run a hot wire to the bat side of the coil and jump the solenoid. now only the coil and points/condensor are in the mix. have you bought any new parts lately like a fuel pump, points,condensor? always suspect the new part you just replaced.the fuel supply can be checked with a fuel pressure gauge. all racers run them.
OK let's try this one. I went to look at a mint 53 Chebby pickup that was for sale by the orig owner. I started the trunk, drove it a few miles and turned it off. It never would restart. The old guy went nuclear and said he had had that problem for 2 years and not one mechanic could find it. I bought the truck at a slight discount and it started right up and ran fine for 3 months, then same problem arose. I happened to wiggle the ignition switch and it ran. The guy had a big old set of keys swinging from the ignition switch and wore it out. Hit a bump and it might quit. I found that a US quarter is just the right size to short out the terminals to restart it on the back of the ignition switch. I also had this problem on a '66 Vette. I drove the car for 2 years without a hitch. New owner had a big key ring and guess what...it quit 10 times from Wisconsin to Michigan. He finally found it and called me. So try a $10 fix- replace the ignition switch. Kermit
I would have to go for a fuel system issue. A coil doesn't need to be polarized,only a generator. It prolly has a crack in a rubber line somewhere(most likely) or a plugged filter(some one has prolly already tried that), something floating in the tank or a weak pump that will allow it to pull enough fuel for low r operation but not enough for a run.
If it sort of coughs and gasps right before it dies, it sounds like a fuel problem. If it just runs fine, then suddenly cuts out like someone turned off the ignition switch, then it sounds like an electrical problem. A friend of mine had a similar problem in an old pickup and it turned out to be a broken pencil in the gas tank fuel pickup tube, which nearly clogged the line. Some goofball had dropped a pencil into the tank. The piece of pencil starved the engine for fuel. It let enough fuel in to idle okay, but not enough to actually drive it more than a few blocks. It took him a few weeks to figure it out. If it's a fuel problem, you would probably have to crank it a while to get fuel back up to the carb to fill the fuel bowl to get it started again, but if it's an electrical problem, it might just magically start up again after letting it cool down on the first crank because there would still be fuel in the bowl. Next time it dies, turn the ignition switch off and look down the throat of the carburetor and pull back on the throttle. You should see fuel squirt in there as you pull on the throttle. If it doesn't squirt, that could mean the fuel bowl is empty, which would mean you have a fuel delivery problem, like dirty fuel filters or kinked or clogged fuel lines. Good luck!
It will cough before it dies. I will check the carb and it squirts gas into the carb. It seems that I always have to let it cool down for 45mins then it starts back up. Should I drop the gs tank and fuel lines? I have a new consedser, coil and points. I am confused and don't know what to do next. Any help would be great. And should I take out the platnium spark plugs. David
Leave the plugs alone since they idle OK. Do not change too many things at once. Eliminate one item at a time. Kermit
also, when I unscrew the two screws on top of the fuel pump, I here alot of air release will gas is being released is this normal. David
Another thing that just occurred to me is that your choke might just be stuck on. Is it a manual choke or an automatic one? If the choke is stuck on all the time, it would start easy cold, but then run awful once it gets hot. Make sure the choke is opening up when the engine warms up (or open it up manually if it's got a manual choke). The choke is a plate that sort of seals off air near the top of the carb to richen up the mixture. Make sure the choke lingage is all free moving. Once the engine is hot, the choke should be all the way open and sitting vertically. A very dirty air filter will have the same effect as having the choke stuck closed. For a quick test, take the air filter completely off and try driving it like that and see if it runs better. I'd start with replacing the fuel filter and air filter and checking if the choke works right. If for some reason your fuel line is getting very hot, like it's running close to an exhaust manifold or hot headers, there's a problem called "vapor lock" that could cause the problems you're having. It happens when cheap gas (or gas additives) in the fuel lines get so hot that the fuel starts to vaporize inside the fuel line. When that happens, it can kill your fuel delivery, and it'll stall out. Then after it cools down, it'll run fine again. That's usually only a problem in hot weather in cars with a lot of heat under the hood, headers, etc.
The Jalopy Journal
