My son was driving the xj6 and when he pulled out of service station car cut off. I have no spark, changed ignition mod, jumped white/w red stripe starter relay wire and engine turns over without a spark. Tested coil 12v + terminal (have power at coil) But no spark from coil or plugs. Have I missed something? Seems to be no output or an open to the distribitor from ingition circuit?

Im about to order a new starter relay as I only have a test light and not a meter to test the relay itself.

Any advice would greatly be useful

Thanks

 

Not unusual for a coil to fail, so there's something to check. It should have about 1.0 ohm primary resistance and about 8k ohm secondary resistance.

Wiring at/to/from the coil often fails with age and heat exposure

Less common is failure of the "pick-up" inside of the distributor



Here's a checklist for the Constant Energy Ignition:



The test assumes a fully charged battery

1) Measure voltage at coil "+" terminal with key "on". It should be within
one volt of battery voltage. If not suspect a problem with the wiring to the
ignition switch, or the switch itself.

2) Measure voltage at the coil "-" terminal. Result should be the same as at
the "+" terminal. If Ok, go to step 3. If not....
Disconnect the wire from the amplifier from the "-" post of the coil and
measure voltage again. Less than 2 volts means the coil is faulty. More than
2 volts means the amplifier is faulty.

3) Disconnect distributor pickup coil from the amplifier (this is the
harness from the distributor that plugs into the amp). Measure resistance
across the terminals. It should be 2.2k to 4.8k ohms. If Ok, go to step 4.
If not, replace the pickup.

4) Reconnect the pickup to the amplifier. Measure voltage at coil "-" post
while cranking engine. The voltage should drop. If OK, go to step 5. If
not, the amplifier is faulty.

5) Check distributor cap and wires, distributor rotor arm, spark plugs, coil
wire




Gah! Forget the above test, then. You'll need a meter.


If the starter operates when the key is turned to "start" then the starter relay is OK. It won't having any bearing on a "no spark" problem

Cheers
DD