Olive Died Yesterday

[onetrackwonder]

Having a run down to Cobargo in Olive to do some chores yesterday and five minutes sitting on about 80 kph through the twisty bits on the highway south of Tilba she just died, first time in about 2500 km since I got her back on the road after sitting in a shed for 32 years, luckily I just made it into someones driveway in the middle of a big bend on the crest of a hill, no stutter or cough just instantly dead, I tried to diagnose on the side of the road, I pulled the distributor and changed the points and condensor but there was no power from the coil, I didn't have a spare coil with me so I rang a mate and he came and got us and went home and grabbed our trailer and went back and got her.

Today I pulled the coil of our air cooled T3, as our other Blue T2 Sopru's engine and coil is up in Nowra awaiting a rebuild, i'm not sure if the T3's coil is the same but when I tested them the T3'S coil came in at 3.6 ohms, I had a read and they say its good if between 3 ohms and 4.5 ohms, and bad if over that range, when I tested the original coil that I believe has failed it came in at 2 ohms, so outside of the recommended range but on the wrong side of the fail, with the ignition on I could get power on the positive of the old coil but when turning the engine over with the test light on the negative I got nothing, on the new coil I got power with the ignition on with the positive and on the negative turning the engine over I also got power on and off as the points open and closed, she then started straight up, Im no expert on anything mechanical so was wondering if a coil that registers 2 on the ohm scale is a dud.

I also checked the fuel pump and it was all good, and as I said it fired back up today with the new coil but i'm not convinced that I have actually found a problem, i'm more worried it could have been a wire shorting somewhere, saying that its been a bit stressful as we leave Tuesday for Nambucca/Valla, looking to the brains trust for some guidance, cheers Greg

[Kahuna Kombi]

If not already done then do a check on the distributor - free play/movement laterally in the shaft can mean she's kaput 

[Cbus]

Having a run down to Cobargo in Olive to do some chores yesterday and five minutes sitting on about 80 kph through the twisty bits on the highway south of Tilba she just died, first time in about 2500 km since I got her back on the road after sitting in a shed for 32 years, luckily I just made it into someones driveway in the middle of a big bend on the crest of a hill, no stutter or cough just instantly dead, I tried to diagnose on the side of the road, I pulled the distributor and changed the points and condensor but there was no power from the coil, I didn't have a spare coil with me so I rang a mate and he came and got us and went home and grabbed our trailer and went back and got her.

Today I pulled the coil of our air cooled T3, as our other Blue T2 Sopru's engine and coil is up in Nowra awaiting a rebuild, i'm not sure if the T3's coil is the same but when I tested them the T3'S coil came in at 3.6 ohms, I had a read and they say its good if between 3 ohms and 4.5 ohms, and bad if over that range, when I tested the original coil that I believe has failed it came in at 2 ohms, so outside of the recommended range but on the wrong side of the fail, with the ignition on I could get power on the positive of the old coil but when turning the engine over with the test light on the negative I got nothing, on the new coil I got power with the ignition on with the positive and on the negative turning the engine over I also got power on and off as the points open and closed, she then started straight up, Im no expert on anything mechanical so was wondering if a coil that registers 2 on the ohm scale is a dud.

I also checked the fuel pump and it was all good, and as I said it fired back up today with the new coil but i'm not convinced that I have actually found a problem, i'm more worried it could have been a wire shorting somewhere, saying that its been a bit stressful as we leave Tuesday for Nambucca/Valla, looking to the brains trust for some guidance, cheers Greg

Given that the coils we run are rated at 3+ ohms i would be tempted to think that 2 ohms showed a breakdown of the insulation which could be worse when hot.
Even a healthy 3 ohms coil will ,at least temporarily, not work if overheated by leaving  ign on when engine not running.

Did the points look burned ?

[onetrackwonder]

Given that the coils we run are rated at 3+ ohms i would be tempted to think that 2 ohms showed a breakdown of the insulation which could be worse when hot.
Even a healthy 3 ohms coil will ,at least temporarily, not work if overheated by leaving  ign on when engine not running.

Did the points look burned ?

Sorry for the long gap between posts Cbus, but to answer your question no the points still looked new so i'm guessing the coil was an instant fail, on the bright side the coil that I robbed from our air cooled T3 to get her going has just run 2300km without issue to Nambucca and back so happy days, cheers Greg