Installed a rebuilt HEI back in the spring. Works great, much better performance. In the last few months, happend about 4 or 5 times, all of a sudden car won't start. Tap on the distributor and it fires right up. Anyone have any idea what could be wrong ? o No:
distributor problem hello, thats funny ,back in the day ,i remember a time when i had a 455 stage 1 in my 66 and a buddy and i was out parked with some ladies , drinkin some beverages and for some wierd reason it would fire up ... i messed with everything , really, it wasnt a play to get with the ladies . but i chased everything ,stumped. finally i hit the top of the coil and and it started , my best guess was i had accell hei super coil and it came loose a and maybe that flat metal ground strap wasnt grounding , bought a new cap and made sure the coil was tightend down . thanks for the memory and good luck-steve
REmove the coil, and check for bad/dirty ground connection. Also the pole piece(pickup coil) can cause an intermittent no start condition.
HEI car won't start I had the same thing happen, car would stall, rarely, or just wouldn't start, then I'd tap the distributor and bingo, fired up. Turns out it was a loose ground and tapping it would shift wire in cap enough to fire it up. Once I took the two minutes to tighten it up, car has started up everytime. Make sure everything is tight, the screws that hold down coil and the one where the ground strap wraps around then see what happens. In worse case scenerio, it could be a coil going bad but check tightness first. Allen allioop108@aol.com
I'll check to make sure all is tight with the coil in cap and ground. Larry70 GS, what is the pole piece (pick up coil) and how do I check it ?
pole piece and pickup coil the pickup coil/pickup unit is the round unit in the center connected to the vacumn advance pull-off, in the dist around the dist shaft . it pickup signals from the rotating striker on the shaft, that has those little 8 points that spin with the dist it(pickup coil has coorasponding points that send signals to the ignition module) as the matches cylinder needs fire . they do go bad , yet ive seen when they quit , they wont work ittermittedly- they quit . as for the pole piece we are talkin about , thats the copper post ya insert into the hole below the coil thats the post that contacts the center of the rotor . on one side of it is a spring the makes contact with the coil , it can develope rust, install a good clean one and put on a good amount of diolectric grease around both sidesof the rubber gasket and over the spring and and matching coil contact . .later-steve
Steve, Good information. Years ago, I purchased an Accel blueprint HEI distributor for my then Buick 350. From almost day one, I had an intermittent no start condition, that left me stranded more than once. I replaced the module a number of times, as well as the coil, and wiring. Every once in awhile, I'd get stuck. Finally I realized the only thing I hadn't replaced was the pickup coil. When I replaced it, I never had another problem. Dino, to replace the pick up coil, the gear has to come off, and the shaft has to be removed. There is a round wire clip(like a snap ring), that holds it to the body of the distributor.
clip holding in the pickup dont let tearing a dist. apart scare ya. its fairly easy , and that flat little round clip can piss ya off , get under it with a pick and try to turn it out with out distorting it .though ive had some dist.'s that the clip was already missing , dont worry all gm hei's used the same clip if ya have another hei out of something else , be prepared to rob it . no parts store is going to have one. but like ive seen many cars are out there running with out that damn clip.
I'll try the simple things first. Check coil connections and that spring loaded contact. If it still persists I'll change the pick up coil. While we speak of the coil and pick up, I noticed at installation that those eight points are so close they actually, just ever so lightly, seem to touch and the shaft can be moved up and down axially but there is no side play as in a worn out busuing to speak of. Is this normal ? When I switched to the HEI, I went to my local parts store and purchased a rebulit unit. Then I pulled all the stock stuff and replaced with a Pertronix 50,000 volt kit (similar to MSD kit). The reason I used Pertronix kit is because Pertronix owed me price of one of those point replacement magnetic lobe sensing pic ups after two went bad in my old points distributor.
They shouldn't touch at all. They can be really close, but they should not touch. You can adjust this with the mounting screws. The up and down play is normal. Should optimally be about .012-.015
With magnetic type pickup, they can seem to touch. The resistance you feel is simply the magnetic force.
