I may have just burned my ignition down to the ground...

[JessN16]

Haven't converted the 87 igniter over to 88 yet, but now I may have no choice.

 

Had to drive the 87 to work today out of necessity. When I left at lunch to go see a client, I started down this long mountain hill near my office and all of a sudden realized the stock boost gauge was going absolutely berserk. It was bouncing from whatever the low number is (-7 or -15) up to 15 and back again, just flopping around like a fish. As I'm pondering this, I look down at the bottom of the hill and notice the light is changing to red, so I clutch and brake to stop and the entire car goes dead as a doornail.

 

So now I'm trying to get it running again by going down to third gear and backspinning the engine, but it refuses to catch. I fight it down the hill with no power steering or brakes and barely get it shut down before I go out in the middle of a big intersection. I try to restart it a couple of times but it won't idle. Same problem I've been having with the car.

 

A deputy arrives, and offers to help. Turns out he was a 15-year employee at a Ford dealership, as a mechanic, prior to joining the force. I tell him what I think it is, and he goes to grab the ignition coil and scorches his hand. I get a screwdriver to try to tap on the 87 igniter, and on the first tap the screwdriver goes right through the case, which is half-melted and cracking and breaking up.

 

I have a spare 87 igniter in the parts bag, but I've never gotten it to work. Still, I'm desperate to move the car. So the officer and I change out the igniter, but no dice. The tach is pretty much stuck on 0, although it did halfheartedly bounce a couple of times. The old igniter, by the way, was about a million degrees when I got it out of the car.

 

So now we have some more information about this whole igniter saga:

 

1) The stock boost gauge is now going bananas,

2) The coil and the igniter both are very near the point of catching fire,

3) I hope nothing else got burned/ruined during this, but I can't say. I didn't see any other heat damage to the wires, but that doesn't mean nothing was done.

 

What would cause the ignition system to heat up like this? At least now I feel the running-like-crap problem I had last week was indeed related to the quality of spark I was getting and not the BOV.

 

Jess

[JessN16]

One other thing: Need to add that this all happened in the span of about 5 minutes -- meaning, heating up the ignition from normal temperature to gawdamighty-that-thing-burnt-my-hand. I had barely made it a quarter-mile from the office when it went nuclear.

 

Jess

[Shelby]

the igniter is load'd by the coil, a short'd coil will cause the igniter to over load it's self,, while the igniter may go bad it can also burn up the dist pick up,,

 

if i were you i'd replace all 3 , dist pick up, coil and igniter ,, and do a wireing integerity test ,, older chyrs had this problem for a bunch of years but they use'd a balist resistor so the resistor would burn up just any time it felt like it,, all due to the coil over loading the igniter

[JessN16]

the igniter is load'd by the coil, a short'd coil will cause the igniter to over load it's self,, while the igniter may go bad it can also burn up the dist pick up,,

 

if i were you i'd replace all 3 , dist pick up, coil and igniter ,, and do a wireing integerity test ,, older chyrs had this problem for a bunch of years but they use'd a balist resistor so the resistor would burn up just any time it felt like it,, all due to the coil over loading the igniter

 

Shelby,

 

I would be inclined to agree were it not for one thing: I had a Bosch Red coil in this car prior to all these problems starting, and the car wouldn't start. I changed the Bosch coil to a stock coil and it still wouldn't start until Jimmy had me bang on the igniter with a screwdriver. Unless both coils are/were bad, I think the problem was the igniter, since tapping on it made the car crank.

 

The only other explanation I have is that either the igniter or the coil aren't grounding well, and I'm not even sure whether a coil has a ground to begin with. I feel the reason everything got so hot was that the electrical components weren't able to get a good ground and were stressed. Do you think I'm on the right track, and if so, is there something I can jumper with a good ground to test this?

 

Jess

[Indiana]

What is wired to the coil exactly, the color of the wires and where they go. Was the Bosch coil for electronic ignition or just a standard coil?

[JessN16]

What is wired to the coil exactly, the color of the wires and where they go. Was the Bosch coil for electronic ignition or just a standard coil?

 

I'll have to go look at the wires tomorrow afternoon when the light it better, but I can tell you the Bosch coil was just a straight-up replacement for the stock coil. No electronic ignition.

 

Jess

[Indiana]

I'll have to go look at the wires tomorrow afternoon when the light it better, but I can tell you the Bosch coil was just a straight-up replacement for the stock coil. No electronic ignition.

 

Jess

The stock coil is for electronic ignition, there's a label painted on it to that effect. There is a resistor in the ignition wires on old cars and there is no resistor in those coil and you put 12v to them they get hot and burn up. The resistor in the ignition wire on old cars after the car is running lowers the voltage down to maybe 6 or 7 volts. You stock coil had full 12v all the time and that resistor is inside the coil not in any of the wiring.

 

 

I think your coil might just be fried. If you bought the type coil for the system below then by now its burned up. This system also needs a second wire so while the starter is cranking the motor over the ignition system sees 12v so it starts easier, sometimes it comes from the ignition switch sometimes it comes from the starter.

(from the dawn of the automobile to 1974)

http://www.familycar.com/classroom/Images/IgnitionDiagram.gif

 

[JessN16]

Alright, well now I don't know what the answer should be. Here's the timeline:

 

1) I buy the car, it has a stock Mitsu coil. This is in 2000.

2) In or around 2004, I buy a Bosch Red coil. The only thing I did was take the stock coil out and put the Bosch coil in. It works fine until...

3) ...2008, when apparently my 1987 igniter starts to go kaput. The car goes dead, off and on, over a period of 2 months before finally shutting down for good in the fall of 2008.

4) I change out the Bosch coil to a stock Mitsu coil in attempt to get the car running. There is no change in the car's status, however, and it continues to sit until 2010.

 

And all this leads me to the following:

 

About two weeks ago, I called Jimmy Ainsworth and he walked me through the process of testing the factory electrical system. The Bosch coil was throwing no spark. I changed over to the factory coil, and it was throwing no spark either. Jimmy had me take the cap and rotor off the distributor and try to create a spark using a screwdriver, but there was no spark there. The tach needle was stuck to 0, and the car refused to start, showing no spark at the coil or the distributor.

 

I then, on Jimmy's advice, tap the 87 igniter with a screwdriver and the car fires up. It continued to run for a couple of weeks, but would start to struggle once running for 20 minutes or so. Then, on 7-19-10, it quit while going down the road just a minute or two after startup. While troubleshooting on the side of the road, we found that both the coil and the 87 igniter were broiling hot to the touch. The igniter had gotten so hot, in fact, that the black plastic cover cracked under the stress and self-destructed.

 

Currently, I have an 88 igniter in my possession and I'm waiting on a pigtail connector in order to change it over from the 87 system to the 88 system. What I'm trying to ascertain is why did I get this excessive heat buildup in the system in such a short amount of time, especially since during my earlier troubleshooting, changing out igniters and coils didn't make any difference.

 

Jess

[Indiana]

You don't need a connector to be able to unplug your ignitor, its a convenience. Cut the plug off your new ignitor and just wire it in or slice in before the plug and leave it there, at least for testing.

 

If you had to guess, how much did you drive the car in that time period? I've had cars that have sat in a garage that long.

[JessN16]

 

 

If you had to guess, how much did you drive the car in that time period? I've had cars that have sat in a garage that long.

 

Between the time we got it running again, and July 19? Well, we got it running the day before Pigeon Forge meet (considered driving it to PF -- thank goodness we didn't), so that would have been around July 2. I probably drove it to work 3-4 times and around town a few times. Maybe 200 miles total in those two weeks?

 

Jess

[Indiana]

Maybe that was how long it took to burn out and melt that ignitor. Doesn't the coil have a part # on it or some printing or something?

[Shelby]

the ign coil is ground'd by the igniter,, the igniter has a dedicate'd ground near the igniter ,single wire with screw into the igniter mount plate

 

there is one thing that could have start'd this entire thing,,if the ign key is left on for a long time AND the dist is seting just so, the stator poles and pick up can if in just the right position cause the coil to energize (fire constantly ), if this went on for a long time damage could result to the coil and or igniter

 

also if at any time the coil or a coil was wire'd back wards,,it can cause damage to the igniter , haveing the coil wire'd back wards is the only way i have ever found a bad 88/89 igniter ,thats one igniter in 13 yrs i have found to be bad

[JessN16]

Indiana, I'll look for a part #.

 

Shelby, if the ground for the coil/igniter was compromised -- say, if the screw used to ground it was corroded and/or couldn't get a good ground inside the fender -- could it have caused this overheating problem?

 

Jess

[Shelby]

all i can say is some thing i heard one time" life will find a way " or in this case electricty will find a ground some where