MDZED

To close this post out. It was the gawd dag distributor condenser. The seemingly “unimportant” part (as I’ve seen in countless other research) that keeps your points from welding together also acts as a… condenser. If you’re running into an issue and you have everything there but just not getting the spark from the dizzy, check that. A $15 part and easy to fix.

Thanks! Good advice.

Let me clarify. I’m still learning the lingo. I moved the engine to what I thought was TDC, show my timing dot around 3 degrees off 0, and the distributor rotor at roughly the 11 o’clock position to align with wire 1. I tightened the distributor down to make sure it wouldn’t rotate out of alignment. In this position, the car would start and idle, I could drive the vehicle, BUT, it would die while driving. I would get variable amounts of driving time before it died. In order to get the car started again, I would need to loosen the distributor screw and advance or retard the timing. I don’t know if this circumstantial to my issues. The gas tank is in excellent condition, it’s nice and clean inside, I have visually checked it, and the PO said it was replaced not too long ago. I can hear the fuel running, and can see gas squirt when I rotate the linkage. I really don’t think it’s a fuel issue. I didn’t get the same instructions for that Pertronix conversion in the US. Or they were missing. I made sure the ground was securely tightened with the screw provided to the plate. I will do one more check on the connections and screws and lines for the pertronix conversion. If that doesn’t work, I will reassemble the old distributor and start from there.

I should have mentioned that, yeah I am pretty sure she is getting fuel. After she dies I can look into the carbs and see she is getting fuel when I pull the linkage.

Hi guys, new user, new owner. I have scoured forums, and have an original FSM. Trying my best to search before reaching out, and doubly trying my best not to freak out and start replacing parts or tow to mechanic. I have a 74 260Z. Initially had some issues with starting and battery getting drained. I replaced the alternator with a frontier alternator and bypassed the external regulator. Things were looking great. Weeks later, started to have some running issues, so I took it to mechanic. He installed a new coil, new point, and bypassed the ballast. After getting the car back it was running fine for a few weeks, but started having some issues starting. At some point the car was switched back to a single point dizzy, I bought a zcardepot electric dizzy and tried to swap it in. The rotor was 180 degrees off, so went back to the original single point. But when back on the old point dizzy, had significant running issues, would idle fine and run 2-10 minutes and just lose power. Would not reliably restart, and would have to advance or retard the timing to get off the street. In a likely dummy move, said to hell with it and went down the path of swapping to a pertronix electronic dizzy conversion and getting no results. I think I am painting myself into a corner and want to move smartly back to normal operations. Problem 1: Swapped back to old points dizzy. The car started and idled fine, I checked timing and it looked decent. But would loose power when driving. In order to get off the street, would need to either retard or advance timing to get it started. Moved the engine to close to TDC and adjusted from there. Would again start and idle for a bit, but loose power. Unless I have the engine at TDC, it wont start. If at TDC it will start and run for a bit, but die and not turn over unless at TDC again. Still have the ballast bypassed. Problem 2: Swapped the point to a Pertronix electric conversion. Still Getting zero fire on that. Tested spark to plug and nothing, test spark from coil to dizzy, nothing. Checked if coil was getting power in the on position, ran a wire from neg side on coil and tapped valve cover and had spark. The coil is 1.4ohm and running the ballast as bypassed still. Even tried swapping dizzy wire around from + and -. Fairly certain all wires are connected properly and nothing is hanging loose. Not sure where I go from here, do I keep pursuing the pertronix route or go back to points? If I go back to points, not sure why I am having new problems and where to look next, I am in self denial that another problem has arisen (ICM). Any suggestions would be appreciated, the FSM is a bit short as I am now off the reservation.