I just parked my car on a hill in San Francisco... I'm walking away and then I see some smoke coming from under the hood. I opened the hood and the distributor cap and wires are on fire. I put the fire out, not easy, and take inventory of the damage. I cooked the cap, rotor, and plug wires. I replaced them and it runs like ****. Not all cylinders are firing. I'm thinking I need to replace the distributor. Any help, advice, would be appreciated.

BTW. It was running just fine, as usual. Parked it and then a fire. I make sure that the firing order was correct 1-5-3-6-2-4, when installing the new wires on the cap.

And my hood needs to be painted. What a Friday.

 

what was the source of the fire? did it start at the dizzy?

 

What year is your car? N/A or Turbo?

 

Hi everybody,

It started at the distributor, da dizzy. It's an 1983 N/A. I've changed the rotor, cap, wires, plugs. While it does start, which is always good, it's bogging down, backfiring, and sounds like it's not firing on all cylinders. The plugs I took out smelled like gas. I'm thinking fire at the dizzy might mean I need a new one.

 

Well if it comes down to that I have a spare L28 N/A dizzy. Let me know.

 

Thanks flatback... I didin't know that the distributor turned counter clock wise. So once I reversed the firing order it runs just fine. : )

 

I was just about to make sure you had them on in the right rotation lol
Now I would be looking into why the fire started.

 

Maybe he was doing this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5WUaH0HwV4

 

That video is some crazy stuff.