First time out of the barn in about a year! Could’ a been longer. Last year was an off-year for me and my Studebakers. I think I made it to only one meet last year and no cruise-in. My mother passed away last year and the rest of the year was pretty much devoted to catching up on stuff that had gone neglected during the lengthy period of being her main caregiver for the last seven years. I don’t regret any of the time spent caring for her, but I did fall behind on lots of things and the catching up continues.
I recently finished the major repair of one of my buildings and got my garden prepped and planted, and still have many more projects needing attention. My ‘48 Business Coupe ended up blocked in the pole barn by a miter saw, two wagon loads of tools, and a pile of building supplies. Monday, I set the battery charger up and began charging the battery. Later in the day, I attempted to fire up the engine. NO GO!
So, I transferred the duty of battery charging to my trusty battery maintainer and left the car charging for the day.
The next day was to grab my trusty little spark tester and replace the high tension coil wire with the spark tester. Cranking over the engine, I had a spark from the coil to the top of the distributor cap. But, placing another one of those spark testers on a spark plug revealed that the spark was not getting to the spark plugs? Popping open the distributor revealed an almost new looking point set. Gap checked out fine, but still no fire. Once again, I closed up the distributor and attempted to start. Nothing. So, I finally removed the points. Close examination showed some black carbon deposits and a bit of tungsten transfer from one of the points set contacts to the other. Oops...I have misplaced my points file! So, that was Wednesday’s Studebaker effort. I put the points set in my pocket, finished some other chores, and called it a day. Last night, while watching TV, checking this forum, and various “couch tater” activities, I took my points set, a multi-meter, magnifying glass, a piece of sandpaper, and one of my wife’s ceramic nail files and committed a little surgery on the points. Cleaned up the black deposits and got the contacts nice & shiny.
This morning, I reinstalled the points, set the gap, buttoned everything up, turned on the switch, and using my remote starter button so I could observe the two spark tester lights...hit the switch. I don’t think the engine made one complete rev before firing up!
It sat there purring as if it was saying “what took you so long?”
While the spark tester light on the plug was crisply blinking, the one at the coil was burning bright and almost appearing continuous due to the high idle rpm from the automatic choke. Much brighter than my previous attempts.
Here’s the thing...I had assumed that if a coil discharges, a plug should fire! But...apparently when points have some carbon build-up that inhibits and prevents the full charging of a coil by the primary circuit, although the coil will discharge to the distributor cap...it may not have enough stored power to jump the air gap between the rotor to the distributor lug, or fire a spark plug! So...do not just assume that a coil firing should be sufficient. The coil is not defective, Nor is the rotor and/or the distributor cap bad. That tiny little buildup of carbon deposits on those points created enough resistance to prevent ignition and not let this engine run. Almost imperceptible...a little “smudge” from arcing over time can cause some big trouble.
I thought I would share this because I have seen (and been guilty) of replacing parts when all that needed to be done was a little housekeeping. 
Make sure to check the little things before throwing parts and components at your problems.
So...here’s my little baby after a bath. Now, all I need is to find where my tag sticker (expired last August) is and some fresh gas.
I recently finished the major repair of one of my buildings and got my garden prepped and planted, and still have many more projects needing attention. My ‘48 Business Coupe ended up blocked in the pole barn by a miter saw, two wagon loads of tools, and a pile of building supplies. Monday, I set the battery charger up and began charging the battery. Later in the day, I attempted to fire up the engine. NO GO!
So, I transferred the duty of battery charging to my trusty battery maintainer and left the car charging for the day.The next day was to grab my trusty little spark tester and replace the high tension coil wire with the spark tester. Cranking over the engine, I had a spark from the coil to the top of the distributor cap. But, placing another one of those spark testers on a spark plug revealed that the spark was not getting to the spark plugs? Popping open the distributor revealed an almost new looking point set. Gap checked out fine, but still no fire. Once again, I closed up the distributor and attempted to start. Nothing. So, I finally removed the points. Close examination showed some black carbon deposits and a bit of tungsten transfer from one of the points set contacts to the other. Oops...I have misplaced my points file! So, that was Wednesday’s Studebaker effort. I put the points set in my pocket, finished some other chores, and called it a day. Last night, while watching TV, checking this forum, and various “couch tater” activities, I took my points set, a multi-meter, magnifying glass, a piece of sandpaper, and one of my wife’s ceramic nail files and committed a little surgery on the points. Cleaned up the black deposits and got the contacts nice & shiny.
This morning, I reinstalled the points, set the gap, buttoned everything up, turned on the switch, and using my remote starter button so I could observe the two spark tester lights...hit the switch. I don’t think the engine made one complete rev before firing up!
It sat there purring as if it was saying “what took you so long?” While the spark tester light on the plug was crisply blinking, the one at the coil was burning bright and almost appearing continuous due to the high idle rpm from the automatic choke. Much brighter than my previous attempts.Here’s the thing...I had assumed that if a coil discharges, a plug should fire! But...apparently when points have some carbon build-up that inhibits and prevents the full charging of a coil by the primary circuit, although the coil will discharge to the distributor cap...it may not have enough stored power to jump the air gap between the rotor to the distributor lug, or fire a spark plug! So...do not just assume that a coil firing should be sufficient. The coil is not defective, Nor is the rotor and/or the distributor cap bad. That tiny little buildup of carbon deposits on those points created enough resistance to prevent ignition and not let this engine run. Almost imperceptible...a little “smudge” from arcing over time can cause some big trouble.
I thought I would share this because I have seen (and been guilty) of replacing parts when all that needed to be done was a little housekeeping. Make sure to check the little things before throwing parts and components at your problems. So...here’s my little baby after a bath. Now, all I need is to find where my tag sticker (expired last August) is and some fresh gas.
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