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Old 08-04-2021, 07:42 AM   #8
philcobill
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Join Date: Jul 2021
Location: Walworth, New York
Posts: 138
Default Re: Ignition coils too far out of range?

Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevin in NJ View Post
A coil can appear fine resistance wise but fail in operation. I do not know numbers, but as a kid I was in charge of testing all the coils for selling at the flea markets. Something about making that blue arc.

Quite a few would work fine cold. Let them heat up and they died off. My guess is they would test fine resistance wise on a meter.

I also have some problems with measuring the resistances accurately. Most guys are not electronics savvy. It is easy to get wrong readings with a crappy meter, poor leads, or dirty connections. At these resistance values you can be off by quite a bit. So I would not always trust an average person to know if they might be getting a good reading. This is a comment from a person who does a lot of electronics troublshooting and has watched people do it wrong. Oh and the people doing it wrong in some cases were electronics engineers.

The only way to know if you have a good condensor or coil is with a coil condensor tester. Anything else is no better then a guess in the end.

So what you are saying is that the resistance readings in Les Andrew's book are an approximate guess or an indication, and not definitive.

A local Model A club mechanic told me that if the voltages are fine (6.3 V +-) at the appropriate places it should be all right.

So, where does it leave someone like me who does not have a coil condenser tester at their immediate disposal?

Bill

Walworth, NY

Last edited by philcobill; 08-04-2021 at 07:48 AM.
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