Ignition problems

65inworks

Founding Member
Jul 10, 2002
101
0
16
sacramento,ca
I have a 65 mustang that is having ignition problems. I have added an electric fan with a painless harness, an electric fuel pump that i wired to the accesory fuse, a MSD 6al that i wired to the original coil wire, and i am running a late model mustang starter that eliminates the fender mounted starter solenoid. Now out of no where my car died on me in the middle of the road so i had it towed home, now i have no power except headlights, taillights, brakelights and dome lights. the blinkers dont work, the car wont turn over, fuel pump doesnt run. Any ideas of what i could have done. Is it possible that I burnt out the ignition switch.
thanks Nick
 
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Some GM guys move their solenoids off the starter to the fender to keep them away from exhaust heat. I'd check for header to harness short first. I have not heard much about bad ignition switches, but should be easy to check with a test light or V/O meter. Where did you move the terminals that are on the stock solenoid?
 
I also rewired my car with a painless kit. However I used the universal kit. My car did the same thing. It died in the middle of a 4-way on me. The problem was the ignition switch wire had come loose.
 
i was talking about the switch in the column, that screwed me once.....it wouldnt turn over...... and well i had to replace the switch anyways cause the lights didnt work it and kablam wouldnt you know it, once i changed that out it fired right up.....dont ask why or how cause i dont know, it was just a stroke of luck i figured......
 
Does the painless kit have a new wire for the coil, or is your MSD running of the stock coil wire? I think the stock wire has a ballast resister to protect the points in the distributer(which won't allow full voltage to the coil)...Just another thing to think about..
 
On your first topic, I think the amount of amperage that an electric fuel pump runs is kind of high to run through the accessory circuit by itself. Does the pump have a relay in its circuit, or does the full amperage run through the ignition switch? Also, did you check all the fuses?
 
so today i decided to try putting a new ign. switch in the car but that didnt help. i checked the post off the back of the ign switch for voltage and there is none. the only wire that seems to have voltage is the yellow loop, but it seems like that has constant power. any ideas?
 
65inworks said:
so today i decided to try putting a new ign. switch in the car but that didnt help. i checked the post off the back of the ign switch for voltage and there is none. the only wire that seems to have voltage is the yellow loop, but it seems like that has constant power. any ideas?

Maybe a silly question, but did you check the fuses?

The main power in wire at the Ig Sw. HAS to have voltage unless a fuse is blown, the wire has come fried/loose, or conceivably, a fusible link has blown.
 
does the fuel pump not run at all, or does it run for a second, then stop? Most late model cars(efi setups) wont run the fuel pump if it doesn't get a rpm signal from the distributer. So if the pump starts for 2-3 seconds, then shuts off, then at least you know you have power to the pump, and you might look to the distributer to make sure that you get an rpm signal. If the pump wont do anything at all, then look for blown fuses.
 
lastly, the wire from your starter solinoid should be hooked up to the blue-red on your ignition switch. It provides power to the starter solinoid when cranking. The power is probably grounded the case of the motor. According to the wiring diagrams, the brown wire on the old solinoid was for the starting bypass for the coil so that the coil would get full voltage when the engine is cranking. I doubt that a late model starter would have the second wire on the solinoid.)
When the key is in the crank position, the blue-red should have full voltage.