69 340 problems
George,
Don't worry about the dist. drive gear bushing at all! NOT your problem.
You need to have a good spark. Again, pull the coil wire gently out of the dist. cap for starters. Have someone crank the engine while you hold it close to a ground. The spark should jump at least 1/8" to 1/4"! Yes. wear gloves or hold the wire with insulated pliars.
Tell us about the gasoline. Is it brand new? Are you sure it's good? Water in it or mixed with diesel or who knows?
The one wire from the dist. to the coil, is it hooked on the (-) or negative side of the coil?
Another important check would, to BE SURE while cranking, that you are getting BATTERY VOLTAGE to the (+) side of the coil! You will have to measure battery voltage while cranking @ the battery then jump over to the coil. It should be very close to the same reading. Like 11.5v. at battery and 11.0v. at the coil. An easy check for this is to have a jumper wire, attach one end to the (+) battery and the other side to the coil (+) and try to start it. If it starts take the jumper wire off.
Kim-
Gas is brand new, I filled the 5 gal gas can, then put more gas in my Ram from the same pump at the same time so I know the fuel is good. I poured the gas from the 5 gal can into the Dart, then went back and got another 5 gallons from the same pump.
The single wire from the dist is connected to the NEG post on the coil.
I will try the jumper wire from the POS battery post to the POS terminal of the coil tomorrow, kids just went to bed.
pull plugs and clean them. after all this they may be fouled. hate to think this was a dirty set of plugs and an originally flooded motor,hold your finger over each plug hole while someone turns it over and check for compression on each cylinder may be a rocker shaft loosened up. but at any rate gas and spark are no good without compression. make sure connections at starter relay are tight also. i think it is the brown one that can keep it from running. If you can find a 20. ohm meter check continuity on the wires in the primary circuit for resistance. a cracked wire can cause a problem like this especially the wire that runs to the points. if one has a lot of resistance jumper around it. hope this helps. wish ya were in houston. i could use a wrenching bud.
I don't think the engine is flooded. Last week I pulled a few plugs after cranking the engine over for (seemingly hours) a while, and they were dry as a bone. Thats why I thought the carb was bad.
I can do a compression check, but like I said the car ran like a top until all of a sudden, while idling in my garage, it quit.
I will check all connections at the starter relay.
All the wiring harnesses from the firewall forward are brand new except for the wiper motor wiring. My wipers don't work, but could this have any effect on the engine running? The wipers haven't worked since I put the car back together.
I wish I had a wrenchin buddy too. I'm about to pay Kim's airfare to come out here and fix this thing for me!
I'll report back tomorrow. Thanks for all the help so far guys.
George