Distributer top plate wobble.

Grape PI

Grape PI

Junior Member
I have a fair amount of play in the top plate on my distributer. The car starts fine and idles well. However, as you drive it, it will intermittently miss and buck. Yesterday, I barely made it home. It stalled as I pulled in the driveway. I retarded the spark advance and started it like I normally would. She fired right up and ran fine into the garage.

Is it normal to have slop in the top plate? It appears to really mess with the opening and closing of the points.

KP
 
Here's how Marco took up the slop.


Bob
 

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The slop needs to go,but it I’m wondering if the wire under the plate could be shorting out as well. Your problem sounds a little severe for a loose plate alone.?? Plus you say you retard and it smooths out, which would move that wire around.
 
The slop is quit a bit. I can actually manipulate the points by wobbling it as I attempt to time it.

I pulled the top plate off to check that annoying wire underneath. All seemed good.
 
My guess is that the wear has been there for some time. I removed the distributor when I changed the head gasket. I likely got jarred and whatever gunk was in there keeping it centered became disturbed.
 
Ok, this all began with a blown head gasket. Long story short, I opted to change plugs as well. I gapped them all at .030. The car had a distinctive miss when I put it back together. I determined that #2 cylynder was not firing. I pulled the plug, and there was almost no gap. Apparently we dropped a plug at some point and messed up the gap. Runs great now!
 
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