Starting an A with out a Key

1

1967 Ford

Member
It looks like it would hard to hotwire an A with out cutting into the armored cable. Does anyone know any tricks? Occasionally I have to deal with defective ignition switches and a A does not seem easy like a 1960's car to bypass. I would hate to have to be towed when all it needs is hotwiring to get home.
 
I'm not clear as to what the prob is.

You can remove the dissy, unscrew the cable, stick a nail in a cork and push it into the cable end's place making contact with the plate inside. Then bring power to the nail.
 
Bratton's and Synders sell an emergency ignition jumper cable. Page 72, item 16360 in Bratton's catalog. It might be a good idea for one person on a tour to have one of these jumpers under a seat for possible use. Pretty much the same idea as Clem's, above.
 
this is what bud mentioned or you can make one
 

Attachments

  • image.jpg
    image.jpg
    56.2 KB · Views: 206
Clem Clement said:
I'm not clear as to what the prob is.

You can remove the dissy, unscrew the cable, stick a nail in a cork and push it into the cable end's place making contact with the plate inside. Then bring power to the nail.
Click to expand...

Power of course ONLY in the sense that it's the ground side of the coil going to the points and NOT battery voltage.:eek::)
 
BudP said:
Bratton's and Synders sell an emergency ignition jumper cable. Page 72, item 16360 in Bratton's catalog. It might be a good idea for one person on a tour to have one of these jumpers under a seat for possible use. Pretty much the same idea as Clem's, above.
Click to expand...

I made one of these from an old "skinny" replacement armored cable that was junk at the switch end. I keep it in my little tool kit in the trunk. I had a switch fail 2 miles down the road at the petrol station. This got me home!!:)
 
We have our hands full here! LOL
 

Attachments

  • 8241701-robber-and-the-thief-hijacks-the-car.jpg
    8241701-robber-and-the-thief-hijacks-the-car.jpg
    26.4 KB · Views: 93
Hook up a T coil with two alligator clips and plug in the secondary wire and be running in less than a minute. Bypasses switch, cable, points, ammeter, coil, and distributor plate. I've used it on several occasions on tours. (Other people's cars).
It's not a fix-all, but will get you to a safe place. Probably used by a lot of car thieves.
 
Remove the screw from the end of the condenser that is toward the center of the engine. Replace it with a long screw that sticks out of the distributor. Clip one end of a wire to the long screw, and the other end of the wire to the coil post that goes to the ignition switch.

To further refine this, before you put the long screw into the condenser, run two nuts onto the long screw and jamb them together at the appropriate length to tighten the condenser against the lower plate. That is, jamb the two nuts together at the same length or depth as the short screw you removed, so that the long screw will tighten the condenser against the lower plate of the distributor, just like the short screw did. You can also use a short piece of wire with two alligator clips to run from the long screw to the coil.

No need to remove the cable from the distributor or loosen the distributor. This is the easiest system I have been able to come up with. I don't like to loosen the head nut to remove the cable from the clip on the head stud.
 
spdway1 said:
We have our hands full here! LOL
Click to expand...
No problem there, Speedy, he lives in a cold area & his hands are so cold, it takes both of them to negotiate the key in the lock! "Yes, occifer, jist goin' fer bread & milk":D Bill W.
 

Attachments

  • BREAD & MILK.jpg
    BREAD & MILK.jpg
    5.2 KB · Views: 21
Last edited:
J Franklin said:
How often do you "have to deal with defective ignition switches"?
Click to expand...


I carry a by-pass cable as shown in the earlier post, only I didn't buy it from a supplier, I made it from a discarded pop-out cable end. In fact I made up several. I carry one in the car along with a couple ready to go distributors and I have used them a number of times on tours on other people's cars. When you are on a tour and a car won't start and a quick check with a trouble light shows you are not getting power down to the points the expedient remedy is to replace the distributor and clip the power lead of the by-pass cable direct to the coil.

The fault could be anywhere from the wire from the coil to the key switch, the key switch itself, the wire inside the armored cable, the lower plate in the distributor, the wire connecting the two plates together, the points themselves, and as someone is always sure to suggest, "the condenser".

For this reason I never install the cable clamp to the head bolt. No sense compounding a problem out on the road by messing with head torque and flooding the engine pan with water.

Tom Endy
 
The original model a switch was designed to "short" the points to ground so by passing the switch would not work to steel the car. If you have an original switch you need to, disassemble the distributor, place some kind of insulator between the cable end the lower plate. then apply power to the points.
 
At a tour 2 weeks ago a guy had a short somewhere in his car leading up to the coil, we think. There were only about 25 people circled around one car trying to help, so you could imagine the confusion when everyone starts putting in their input. The guy who owned the car had his own jumper wire like posted above, so we installed that, and then I took a jumper wire with alligator clips from the fuse block up to the opposite side of the coil that the armored cable jumper wire was clipped to. (Different for 12 volt and 6 volt) This bypasses the whole ignition, and I think it got him home. Haven't heard otherwise. But to kill the car he just had to get out and disconnect the alligator clip on the starter post.
 
The method presented by W.Michael does not work with an original electrolock popout switch in good working order. As pointed out by Mike V. the original switches short the lower plate contact to ground when in the off position. This function is listed in the original Electrolock patent description and is what kept thieves from easily hotwiring an A as described.

The early and late style popouts used different methods of achieving grounded status after switch break, but the resulting anti-hotwire security was the same.

Later style, with the help of one of Tom W's photos:
PopoutGroundLate.jpg
 
Thanks Mike V. and MikeK. Of course, you are right. I forgot about pop out switches that actually work correctly--I've never had one! My method only works with replacement, non-grounding switches of the after-market variety. That's all I've ever used successfully.

W. Michael
 
cant you run a hot wire from the generator cut out or the starter switch to the coil, and step on the starter and be on the way?
 
Brendan said:
cant you run a hot wire from the generator cut out or the starter switch to the coil, and step on the starter and be on the way?
Click to expand...

No, because the coil is hot full time, and the ignition switch cuts the circuit on the ground side of the coil (coil to points wire).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top