No fire in the ol C

Eric P · Mar 30, 2015

Last fall I put my little farmall C to bed, drained the gas, kissed it good night and patted it on the head. Well, the grass is beginning to get green and the day was perfect to be outside. Thought it might be time to awaken the poor little thing. New gas and a fully charged battery and....spins and spins no fire. Checked the coil, good to go. Filed the points, no change. Replaced the cap and plug wires (cap had some corrosion and one plug wire broke removing it). I have power on both sides of the coil and power to the points but no power to the plugs. What am I missing? Usually things are simple but this one has me stumped! Thank you in advance for your help.

kub6040 · Mar 30, 2015

Rotor , cap or wires , I would double check at points first and maybe
condenser could be week.

David G · Mar 30, 2015

I would suspect points first, you can test that with a light pretty easy.

redgems · Mar 31, 2015

How funny !! Sounds so familiar!!!
I just had that problem with my S.C. 6 volt
WE did a restoration, engine & head rebuilt, rebuilt distributor with electronic ignition ,plugs ,cap, wires , NEW COIL to go with new ignition. We worked on it all day trying to find problem never suspecting the new coil. Upon spark inspection I decided spark looked week ,out of desperation replaced the new high output coil with the OLD o.e.m coil. Turned over once and it was purring.
So, check how strong you feel the spark is ,if little weak, change coil.
I was at wits end, ready to put the points back in. lol.
Tony

Wayne in MN · Mar 31, 2015

First question; are the points correctly gapped at .020"?

Take off cap, check that the points are closed, remove coil wire from cap, hold wire
1/4" from ground and use finger to open points. (switch on) Should see nice blue, snappy spark at the coil wire and spark at the points also. If no spark and you have power at the points then either the condenser wire may be grounded or the points are not clean. Use some lacquer thinner or brake cleaner to chemically clean the points.

Another simple test; use a battery powered (tractor battery) test light and hold at the point wire with switch turned on. Open & close the points with your finger or use the starter; the test light should blink each time the points open & close. (points open = light on, points closed = light off. If the light doesn't change, the points are dirty or grounded.

John T · Mar 31, 2015

If you take the time to work through my Troubleshooting Procedure it can help you find the problem.

John T
John Ts Ignition

gene bender · Apr 1, 2015

Fire at the points means only rotor and cap

mkirsch · Apr 1, 2015

Had this problem last year.

We replaced everything, points, condenser, cap, rotor, coil, plug wires... Still no fire.

We could measure 12+ Volts at the coil so we thought we were getting power. We even tried powering the coil directly from the battery with a jumper wire.

Turns out the problem was a failed ignition switch. Even though you could measure 12V, the resistance was so high that it wouldn't charge the coil. The jumper wire should have showed this, but it turned out to be bad too.

No fire in the ol C

Eric P

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kub6040

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David G

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redgems

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Wayne in MN

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John T

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gene bender

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mkirsch

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