Thread: How can I bypass the ign.switch on a 89 chevy TBI

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I have parked my suburban about 2 weeks ago and it has not turned on since. It was not giving any problems when I parked it , it was running fine. I have replaced coil and ign. module and still nothing. It has fuel and good fuel pressure. I pulled one of the spark plug wires and had some one turn the engine over and there is no spark at the plugs. Thanks for any help.

First of all, IF the thing was running fine when you parked it, I would remove the rotor in the distributor and look for carbon tracks....many times, people buy cheap crap caps and rotors and the things have such poor dilectric properties that they arc thru. The rotor will have a very tiny pin hole where it grounds to the distributor shaft. Many times, just taking the rotor off and cleaning it will solve the problem for a day or so....if your rotor is bad, buy a Delco....not the cheap crap from the "auto supply" place.

If your ignition is an HEI, you can run a hot wire to the distributor and bypass everything. You can make a pigtail from wire and a female spade lug.

mike in tucson

I have replaced the dist cap and rotor with a cheap one from auto supply but still nothing. I have checked the codes also and there is nothing. If the timing chain jump a tooth would it still get fire? I dont know , but I did pull a spark plug wire and stuck a screw driver in it and held it about 1/8" away from the chassis and theres no spark at all. It has the external coil. I also poured a little gas down the throttle body and nothing still.

check the wire from the negative terminal of the coil to the distributor. I had a similar problem on my old Ford, where the wire was bad, even though it looked good!

I have pretty much checked everything and cut figure it out . Going to try the pick up coil in the dist.