Help keep a grown man from crying

Also if you ever break down with all kind of fancy looking modern so called Model A upgrades, & some old or maybe very, very old Model A guy or very old Model A club member stops & tries to help, those modern points on a modern top plate will look as complicated to him as his brand new cell phone that his daughter bought for him yesterday -- & he probably still does not know how to answer his cell phone when his daughter called him 15 minutes ago.

Hope this helps.
 
Now that we've proven the carb was not the cause of it not starting, lets look at something else. When you get it started and try to rev it a bit, is ANY water coming out of the tail pipe?
 
Lol thank you all so much for your patience with a newbie! I am going to switch back to the original points but will pick up a new Condensor and coil today. Remember this thing cut out repeatedly before barely running at all before my virgin hands started messing around in there. So there was something going on. I'm going to pick up a set of new proper type points also as these had some wear.

Again I understand there are going to be some teething issues. The previous owner did a nice job of restoring the car but drove it very little in the ten or twelve years since. I'm quite experienced with air cooled vws and it seems like the ones that sat and sat give issues similar to the ones I'm having now , but the ones that get 15,000 miles a year of use just keep on ticking along. The A seems to be a well made, well thought out car and once I get through these issues, I'll bet it delivers a lot of miles with few problems.

Still curious as to what the original problem was but I'm going to keep plugging away at it after work today.
 
No water out of the tailpipe either so far but after I install the proper points, new Condensor and coil if it runs well I'll pay attention to that
 
You didn't mention if you drained the carb bowl. The other day I tried to start my '28 roadster which was running great when parked about 5 weeks ago. It wouldn't even fire with starting fluid. I drained the sediment bowl and allowed some fuel to drain from the tank but it still wouldn't fire. I followed all of the instructions in the Les Andrews blue book but to no avail. Finally I removed the bottom of the carb and found it was filled with water. When I replaced it the engine started right up but ran poorly so I removed the carb and blew everythjing out with my air hose. The engine then ran as good as new.
 
Hi armchair,

In your already mentioning cleaning out your sediment bowl once, combined with mentioning the prior 10-12 years of having an idle 80+ year old gas tank not used often, there is still a "possibility" that when you continue your initial daily sloshing around of new gas in an old tank that old stale fuel sludge & varnish combined with rust flakes & debris could plug your shut off valve & cause your engine to just completely die on the highway.

The most dangerous part is that if your vintage vehicle "possibly" dies on today's highway, today's modern texting vehicle drivers are not at all used to seeing a completely stopped car on the highway.

Just for your life safety, & that of passengers, you may want to consider providing an "in-tank-screen" at the fuel shut off valve -- it will not hurt performance, but can give you peace of mind -- today's 18 wheelers or faster moving vehicles can hit very hard.

Just hope this can help anyone getting out on the highway in today's traffic with a vintage vehicle that was stored & not used often.

Just a few actual experiences to share.
 
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H.L. gave you this info before and here it is again. I think he is right on with this advise. If you use a flashlight and look down into your gas tank, you can spot the drain for the gas. If there is a bunch of crap there, it will show up (at least this works on a 1929 tank). Get this screen and put it in along with the thought, if a crap problem, of maybe cleaning out your tank and maybe sealing it. Good luck!

"2. Go to your parts store, buy & install an A9193-T gas tank screen to filter gas tank debris."
 
when I was 15 years old I got stranded in Oklahoma at my niece's house because daily for four days, I left her house and after backfiring over and over i returned to her Oklahoma house. daily I called my dad in texas and he said "change the condenser" and I told him it was carb, etc. I knew he couldn't know because he was just and old man. on the fifth day, I changed the condenser and went home to texas.

fordman
 
when I was 15 years old I got stranded in Oklahoma at my niece's house because daily for four days, I left her house and after backfiring over and over i returned to her Oklahoma house. daily I called my dad in texas and he said "change the condenser" and I told him it was carb, etc. I knew he couldn't know because he was just and old man. on the fifth day, I changed the condenser and went home to texas.

fordman
 
Maybe I'm missing something. Has anyone mentioned to push up the spark lever before starting the timing process ? Tony
 
When I was 15 years old my Model A came with a very corroded looking condenser & a very rusty coil with a Gerber's baby food can on top. (Before glass jars, baby food came in cans).

The car had always been stored outside & the former owner told me the can was to protect the coil from rusting out because water leaked from the hinge pin area directly above.

I changed the baby food can a few times but never changed the coil or the condenser.

Moral of the story appears to be: Ever since baby food comes in glass jars, coils & condensers do not last very long.
 
I've got a slant pole coil with some holes rusted in the top. I've thought that I may patch the holes and see if it will still work. Being as the original coils were solid tar filled, I wouldn't be surprised if it still works.
 
Purdy Swoft said:
I've got a slant pole coil with some holes rusted in the top. I've thought that I may patch the holes and see if it will still work. Being as the original coils were solid tar filled, I wouldn't be surprised if it still works.
Click to expand...

I have a slant pole coil that some jerk shot right through the center of it. Just for kicks I tried it and it actually gave about 3/16" spark for a few seconds before it died.

If the points are set at .020" then when the timing is set as per #19, the position of the spark lever doesn't matter.:)

Buy the cam lever wrench for a buck or so, as it makes holding the cam while tightening the screw so much easier.:)
 
Tom, You are absolutely correct and I agree completely. If the timing is set as you explain and show in post # 19 It doesn't matter where the spark lever is at the time. Where the rotor tip points with NO clockwise backlash Is the important thing. If it is set any other way, it WILL be out of time NO matter when the points open . Most seem to ignore this fact and in an attempt to get the points opening when they THINK that they should, generally *** around and tighten the points cam with the rotor pointing wrong with clockwise backlash . Clockwise backlash causes the timing to end up retarded. Points gap can easily be checked and adjusted with the spark lever fully retarded without changing The most important direction that the rotor tip must point. There will be enough rotational backlash in the counter clockwise direction of the distributor to locate high cam and check points gap without loosening and messing up where the points cam has been set for the rotor to point as necessary !!!
 
Here's where I'm at with this situation right now. New plugs cap rotor etc. Old style points reinstalled. Timing triple checked. Done as per the book starting with the spark lever up. Drove it a few miles last night. A little lumpy at idle but pulled well enough but some small backfiring when changing gears (foot off the gas). But I went several places and it started every time. It did cut out once-again as if power was cut out or it was out of fuel. Restarted no problem. Went to go to work and it would not start for me.

I'm almost wondering if there could be a short or some other type of issue within the distributor itself. I'm thinking of just buying a replacement dizzy today but not really certain. Also going to go back through some of the recommendations you kind folks have made (although I have done the majority of them so far)
 
Don't remember if it has been covered yet but did you check, now that you have the old style points in, the old wire that runs from the bottom plate to the top plate for shorts/broken/contact to body, etc.??
 
My four year old found the issue. A loose running board bolt. All good now. All kidding aside I'm heading back out there now to go over some of those suggestions-but this may be next generation!
 

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So far no one has talked about the possibility that the ignition cable has been screwed to far into the distributor base and shorting out the system. Usually not an intermittent problem, but may be worth checking.
 
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