No Spark

[Dave Cleveland]

Guys,
I got my ignition a little wet after a bath today and am now having some trouble. I let the engine dry but apparently not enough and I forgot to remove the cap and dry it out. So, it began to backfire and eventually stalled. As of this moment it no longer has any spark.
I've cleaned and checked everything now I'm in the process of determining which part I fried so I can replace it. Problem is, I'm not very good at trouble shooting this sort of thing.

Ignition is Holley Anihilator with Holley coil and distributor.
Engine is a 460
Stock voltage regulator.
Motorsport wires and Motorcraft plugs

All the wires look good but there is absolutely nothing coming out of the coil. As I understand it, there are really only three things it can be; ignition module, coil, or, pickup sensor in the distributor.

If you guys can help me narrow this down that would be great.

Thanks
Dave Cleveland

[Ron61]

Dave,

Make sure that you have voltage going into the coil. A quick easy check after that is to just take a stock coil and put it in and see if the car fires. I switched from Holly coils years ago because they kept going bad. They are most likely a lot better now but I use a Jacobs on all of my cars now. If your distributor has the optical sensor that is very likely the place to look as they will blow quite easily. If you have the inductive distributor like the one I have then it probably isn't the distributor, but you can't count anything out for certain. So try the coil first as they are cheap compared to ignition modules. I keep an old coilin my tool box for just this reason. Only takes a second to hook it up and if I still have trouble then I know which way to go.

Ron

[Dave Cleveland]

Ron,
The pick up is inductive, not optical. It looks like a GM style setup.
So what your telling me is to check the coil first then if that's not it go to the pickup sensor next?

Thanks Dave

P.S. Funny thing is, these fancy ignitions have given me more grief than the stock Ford unit ever did.

[Ron61]

Dave,

I would check the coil first as it is easy and the cheapest part and therefore most likely not the problem. I still have the original dual point distributor in my 1969 T. Cobra and it works great. I don't drive the car a lot though as it is now 34 years old and still has the original old Goodyear Polyglas tires on it.

The easy way to check the coil is if you have another one of any kind, just connect it into the circuit in place of the one you have and see if it gives you a spark. As I said, I carry an old one for that very reason. I am not familiar with the Holly ignition module but if the coil is good and the distributor is good, then it pretty much points to that. The way my Jacob's Pro Street works is that the module instantly stores enough voltage for about 35 plug fireings and it just uses the coil as a transformer. However I do have a fuse that provides power to the Jacobs computer and you may have one for your Holly module. See if you have and if it has blown. I pull that fuse before I do anything with the electrics on the motor as it keeps some things hot all the time. If this doesn't help let me know and we can go step by step. E-mail me if you like and it may be faster than by posting.

Ron