Got the T-bird HOME... Still runs like SHIT

Hey all,


In an effort to be able to actually work on the fucking thing, i brought the car home. What a fucking trip!

Any kind of load and it starts stuttering all over... If i really get into it, i can build some boost before it starts falling all over itself.

We re-checked what we could last night, but we think we found a big problem, if not THE problem.

From what I know about ford single coil ignition systems, the coil output (if looked at with an inductive timing light hooked to the coil to distributor wire) should pulse very steadily, and increase the pulse as RPMs go up. When we hooked the timing light up, we noticed that the coil seemed to "Skip" a pulse here and there, and that directly corresponded to the misfire I'm experiencing. The circuit to fire the coil is as follows:

Coil has battery voltage at the + side (verified correct without interruption).

The hall effect sensor in the distributor sends a signal to the ECU, which tells the ECU when to ground the - side of the coil, causing it to fire. We have tried a known good distibutor/ignition module with no changes in how it runs, and we have also swapped the ECU with no apparent change in the symptoms. This leaves the coil or the coil to distributor cap wire ..... correct? If we can see the coil skipping a pulse and it seems like everything BEFORE that is okay, and we get battery voltage at the coil..... Thats pretty much it....


Hopefully This is the problem that I've been chasing... and the car will be on the road soon. Anybody have any other ideas on what to check?

If you havnt already, just order a new coil and wires. I got an MSD coil for my f150 for like 30 bucks off summit. you wont see any performance gains but its red and looks cool and junk. also it will definately rule out the coil as being any part of the problem.

Well, the wires are newer motorcrafts, and they ohm okay.


The coil I have is an older one..... I'll replace it with a stock coil, since I'll never EVER buy another MSD coil. I had 2 crap out on me within the space of a week. They are definitely NOT made like they used to.

I want to talk shit to you, but I know as soon as I do my car will blow up

LOL Thats right, Karma is a bitch!


Hopefully I can track this down....

Blackout wrote:

Well, the wires are newer motorcrafts, and they ohm okay.


The coil I have is an older one..... I'll replace it with a stock coil, since I'll never EVER buy another MSD coil. I had 2 crap out on me within the space of a week. They are definitely NOT made like they used to.

I've never had a problem with an MSD coil. But, the condition you describe sounds like it could be a culprit... Swap with your stock unit and see what happens.

Do you have any other MSD igniton parts? Like an adjustable rev limiter that may have been messed with?

If someone turned that down to 1 or 2, you won't get anywhere fast. I know this because some old fuckstick was shooting his mouth off at a car show one time. I seen his limiter in plain sight under the hood, and I set that bitch to 2000 RPM on him

did you try new spark plugs too?

Yeah, I tried new plugs, and closed up the gap a bit. The Wires themselves are not more than a year old.... and if I remember correctly, the problems were present before changing them out.

I wanted to clarify, i HAD MSD coils in it, and i ended up going back to stock. I have a known good stocker laying here, and a new coil wire as well.

Moparkid: Nope, no other MSD stuff under the hood, and definitely no adjustable rev limiter. Once I get my Megasquirt, I can control all of that anyways, so i never spent the money on the rev limiter.

Blackout wrote:

Yeah, I tried new plugs, and closed up the gap a bit. The Wires themselves are not more than a year old.... and if I remember correctly, the problems were present before changing them out.

I wanted to clarify, i HAD MSD coils in it, and i ended up going back to stock. I have a known good stocker laying here, and a new coil wire as well.

Moparkid: Nope, no other MSD stuff under the hood, and definitely no adjustable rev limiter. Once I get my Megasquirt, I can control all of that anyways, so i never spent the money on the rev limiter.

why did you go back to stock on the coil? and you have another good stock coil sitting around? id try the other coil but i think there is more going on

Well, I went back to the stock coil after returning the last non-functional MSD. That was.... about 2 years ago. I have one laying around that has low miles that i bought for my bronco 2 last year, which is the exact same coil. Do you have any idea of what I should check after that? LOL I'm pretty much at a loss. Everything I've tested has been in spec, so theoreticly the car should run like a top.

well the fact that the coil is cutting out it is either the coil (from my experience they usually don't come and go they can they can have weak spark and not perform at high cylinder pressures or high RPM but not usually cut out and shit like that) it could also be unit that send the signal to ground the coil be that the PCM the distributor or whatever, or the third thing is wiring if you have an open wire that can't ground when it should it will not spark hell it could even be the connections at said items. it is hard to diag with out the car and with out knowing how the system operates i did read the above post on how it works but im a hands on guy like looking at wires coils all that shit.

LOL I might have to limp the fucking thing out to a meet sometime, just so people can look at it. I'll have the whole fucking toolbox in the trunk if I do that. I'm going to swap the coil tonight if the rain stays away, and see what it does.