8BA just died

harleyjohn45

harleyjohn45

Member
I have an 8BA in a 30 roadster. It has a Jim Linder distributor. I had the distributor installed last summer and the car has about 1000 miles since. Last week I was driving and the car was running great and then it started missing and within 50 yards it totally died. I messed around with the points and got it running and made it home. It has not started since. Plenty of fuel, 12 volts to the ballast resistor, 12 volts to the coil, the points have fire. No fire to the plugs. I was told to check the thin wire from the negative side of the coil to the points for chaffing all was good. I have tried many points settings still nothing at the plugs. I just hate to call a transporter to get it to a mechanic shop. I would prefer to drive it to a mechanic shop.
Would anyone have an idea of what to check at this point.
Any ideas would be appreciated.
John
 
Last edited:
harleyjohn45 said:
I have an 8BA in a 30 roadster. It has a Jim Linder distributor. I had the distributor installed last summer and the car has about 1000 miles since. Last week I was driving and the car was running great and then it started missing and within 50 yards it totally died. I messed around with the points and got it running and made it home. It has not started since. Plenty of fuel, 12 volts to the ballast resistor, 12 volts to the coil, the points have fire. No fire to the plugs. I was told to check the thin wire from the negative side of the coil to the points for chaffing all was good. I have tried many points settings still nothing at the plugs. I just hate to call a transporter to get it to a mechanic shop. I would prefer to drive it to a mechanic shop.
Would anyone have an idea of what to check at this point.
Any ideas would be appreciated.
John
Click to expand...

Mine did this and it was the coil. Coil gets hot and engine dies.........coil cools off and it would run again.
 
Pull the coil wire from the distributor cap , place near good ground and crank with ign on . Should be a spark , if no spark , coil or condenser . If spark , remove any spark plug lead and again place near good ground , crank if no spark bad rotor or cap , if spark check all plug wires and plugs
I'm in lake worth Florida, if near pm me I'll give you my phone #
 
If you have a ballast resistor with 12 volts going to it, there should only be 6 or a little more volts going to the coil. If spark at the points but none at the plugs, the condenser is most likely done for.
 
Voltage to the coil should be in the 7 volt range with the points closed with a 1.5 ohm coil and ~1.5 ballast resistor. With a 3.0 ohm coil there shouldn't be a ballast resistor. It does sound like a coil or condenser issue. What coil are you running?
 
Ggmac said:
Pull the coil wire from the distributor cap , place near good ground and crank with ign on . Should be a spark , if no spark , coil or condenser . If spark , remove any spark plug lead and again place near good ground , crank if no spark bad rotor or cap , if spark check all plug wires and plugs
I'm in lake worth Florida, if near pm me I'll give you my phone #
Click to expand...


What he said.
 
John,

I warranty (repair if needed) all my distributors for life. You can always return and i will reset up the unit etc. The points ( i am assuming its a chev conversion) adjust to 30 degrees of dwell or approx .018. Very seldom does the condensor ever fail.
Depends on when you bought it from me as to what coil it has. After many customer installed coil failures i started putting the matched coil in the box with the distributor to solve the problem.
Just put it in a box and ship it to me and i will return it the day i get it, no charge....

Jim Linder
5237 Ford St.
Indianapolis Indiana 46224
 
Ggmac said:
Pull the coil wire from the distributor cap , place near good ground and crank with ign on . Should be a spark , if no spark , coil or condenser . If spark , remove any spark plug lead and again place near good ground , crank if no spark bad rotor or cap , if spark check all plug wires and plugs
I'm in lake worth Florida, if near pm me I'll give you my phone #
Click to expand...

Here is how it's wired 12 volts to the ballast resistor and the 12 volts out of the ballast resistor, from that point I go to the + side of the coil with 12 volts there also. From the negative side of the coil which is also 12 volts there is a thin wire to the distributor and another wire to the tachometer. There is also 12 volts to the points. I can open and close the points manually, no spark. If I press firmly on the points there is a faint spark.

I will pm you. I live in Cocoa Fl from December till June and from June until December I am in Alto, NM. The summers here are cool & dry with plenty of sunshine.
 
ponymare said:
If you have a ballast resistor with 12 volts going to it, there should only be 6 or a little more volts going to the coil. If spark at the points but none at the plugs, the condenser is most likely done for.
Click to expand...

The coil is a 27470, I may need another ballast resistor.
Thanks
 
BUBBAS IGNITION said:
John,

I warranty (repair if needed) all my distributors for life. You can always return and i will reset up the unit etc. The points ( i am assuming its a chev conversion) adjust to 30 degrees of dwell or approx .018. Very seldom does the condensor ever fail.
Depends on when you bought it from me as to what coil it has. After many customer installed coil failures i started putting the matched coil in the box with the distributor to solve the problem.
Just put it in a box and ship it to me and i will return it the day i get it, no charge....

Jim Linder
5237 Ford St.
Indianapolis Indiana 46224
Click to expand...

Very generous offer Bubba. I like when folks communicate and help each other out. Good Job!
 
I don't know where I bought the coil from, all I know is a 27470 coil was need so I bought that.
here is what I did to test for you.
I removed all leads to the coil and set the multimeter to 200 ohms. red on positive and black to negative read 2.3 ohms. (bouncing between 2.1 and 2.5)
Then red on positive and black to the center of the coil and I got an open circuit. (no resistance)

starting to look like a bad coil.
 
harleyjohn45 said:
I don't know where I bought the coil from, all I know is a 27470 coil was need so I bought that.
here is what I did to test for you.
I removed all leads to the coil and set the multimeter to 200 ohms. red on positive and black to negative read 2.3 ohms. (bouncing between 2.1 and 2.5)
Then red on positive and black to the center of the coil and I got an open circuit. (no resistance)

starting to look like a bad coil.
Click to expand...

Now set meter on 1000 ohms and remeasure the center of coil to positive terminal. Should be ( secondary resistance) 5,000 to 10,000 ohms.

If coil is reading 2.3 ohms NO ballast is needed!!! Would cause very weak spark if one was being used.??????????
 
Here is what I did, my digital meter did not have a 1000 ohm setting. I have an analog meter that had a 1000 ohm setting so I tested from the positive to the coil wire connection. The reading is 6.5 , but I will have to try to dig out the manual and decipher the actual value. It could mean 6.5 ohms or 650 ohms or 6500 ohms. I only use these meters for continuity. I tested from the + to the - with the meter at 1000 ohms and got 0 ohms.

I can remove the ballast resistor and see what the voltage is at the points?
 
This won't help diagnose but it'll tell if it ever was correct . Pull plugs and check for color , obviously it'll be wet and black but look deeper , you may need a magnifying glass . See if any brown exists on the porcelain .
 
harleyjohn45 said:
I tested from the + to the - with the meter at 1000 ohms and got 0 ohms.
Click to expand...

That may just be a meter range issue. Try checking it on 10 ohms range or whatever is close to that. The 1.5 to 3.0 ohms reading will be difficult to see (as in impossible) on a 1000 ohm scale. 6.5 on the 1000 ohm scale should be 650. This is all assuming that the ranges are full scale, if they are per scale marking, as 1=1000, 2=2000, etc then it would be 6500. Same with the lower scale, then it would have to be on something like a 1 ohm scale. See if it has a x1, x10, x1000 type of scale? Then it is you reading times the scale amount.
 
I pulled 3 plugs, they were all the same. very dark, but the porcelain was a brown like milk chocolate. This engine has a edlebrock 500 cfm. I tends to run rich, because I live 7300 ft above seal level and the 500 cfm is more than a 239 needs. I also burn premium gasoline which is 91 octane here.
 
My meters are not professional quality, the lowest setting on the digital is 200 ohms, lowest on my analog is 1000 ohms. Today I checked for Mr. Jim and with the meter set at 200 ohms, I was getting 2.1 to 2.5 ohms. Tonight when I measured from positive to negative i only got 2 to 2.1 ohms. the bad news is when I shorted out by meter it didn't go to zero ohms, It only got to .5 ohms, so that would actually figure out to about 1.5 ohms.

By the way did you ever know the chap in Wichita that built a inline 6 cylinder Indian. I know the old man has passed, but his son is still alive and I believe they have a museum there. The bad thing was they installed a Harley front end on it and that sort of killed all the wonderful work they did on it.
 
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