Well,I finally got tired of fighting with the Duraspark electronic ignition I had put into my '76 Hornet as an "upgrade" from the Presto-lite, so this past Sunday, I pulled the points distributor out of a blue '72 Gremlin I had traded my 1/2 share of an engine hoist and a 4-bbl 6-cylinder intake manifold for, and installed it in the Hornet, to see if the used Duraspark was my problem. Couldn't get a spark, or not a big one, timing light wouldn't fire. After re-pulling the distributor, cleaning up the points in it, and tightening screws up, I reinstalled it, and it got big fat juicy blue spark. Timing light fires off? check! Hit the key, nothing yet...go back , spin the distributor, hit the key again, sputters some....go back, turn it some more, engine fires, catches, runs...woo-hoo! Only 3
MONTHS since I last had it running at all. Stick the light on it, get it set for 8 before, lock it down... running rough. Went back in, pulled up the Internet, Google Engine firing order...1-5-3-6-2-4....Oops! I had it 1-6-3-5-2-4....switch it around, refire----BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ! Hornet is buzzing again! Yay! Sorry, lil blue Gremlin, I"ll get you another distributor soon. I hadn't had any luck getting that Gremlin to fire up, either, last time I tried it ( 5-6 years ago? ), and I believe it was due to the dirty points ( new, but had a film on them, wire burnished them a bit, problem solved! ), so I MAY have fixed the Gremlin's ignition problem as well. I'll know next time I try to fire it up. LOL.
I've had the Hornet out on three small local test trips, the last two were raccoon runs, I've had one ( or two?) in my garage, living upstairs...got out the live trap, got one last night, took it down to the river area near me. Reset the trap
when I got home, this morning I had another one...woo-hoo! A smaller, younger one. That one also got a Hornet trip down to the river area. So that's two down. I've reset it again, probably won't catch anything during the day, maybe a cat of mine. LOL. But will have to work on moving stuff so I can fully close my garage door, that's been my problem. So get that closed, and keep the critters OUT from now on. Making a mess inside.
But finally happy something AMC of mine is running again! Hope to make it 2 ( or 3 ), , going get my Kenosha trip gold Gremlin put back together minus a new head, just run the old one, then work on the Pacer wagon, get the rear axle under it finally, and running again. Time to make some progress!
Anyway, here's a pic of the rac and Hornet at early morning...I"m sure HE wasn't happy, he was growling at me. Heh heh! Sorry, at least you get a river home now. Good luck down there!
Jerry in
Virginia
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