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Ignition Problems

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Y

young MG enthusiast

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I'm a senior at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and I recently purchased a 1976 MGB... without really knowing what I was getting myself into. After many hours spent under the hood, learning about the quirks of MGs, I've really come to appreciate it when it actually works. I'm loving every minute of my MG experience.

Now for the question:

I'm having problems getting my MGB started. Last fall, the last time I was out for the season, I did a really dumb thing. I let my roommate drive. We pulled over, I let him jump in to drive for a while. He started the car, and it was making an awful noise. I should have stopped him right away, but he pulled out onto the road, and we didn't have a safe place to pull back over for a couple minutes. Beads of sweat running down my face, I opened the hood, and all of a sudden it dawned on my roommate to check the key... it was stuck in the "start" position. Yeah, that's right... the starter was running the whole time (about 3 or 4 minutes total). I drove it home and parked it for the winter.......

Well, I knew the starter had to be checked, so I took it off, and sure enough, it was shot. The flywheel teeth are okay thankfully. I had the starter rebuilt and put it in last week. Still, the car wouldn't even try to turn over. Today, I was working on it, and I noticed a very pungent electrical smell coming from around the electronic ignition and ignition coil when I tried to start it. It turns out the ballast resistor is heating up, and heating up quickly.

I fear that I burned something else out when the starter continued to run. If anyone has any ideas about what I should check next, I would really appreciate them. I know you can burn the iginition coil if it continues produce the spark needed for starting... but would this cause the ballast resistor to heat up?

Thanks to all who read this.

[ 03-06-2004: Message edited by: young MG enthusiast ]</p>
 
possibly the starter solenoid got fried ?

mark
 
Hello YMGE,
there is no relevance between the starter failure and the ignition system.
If you had the ignition on for a while when you were trouble shooting the starter this could overheat the ignition system. The best thing to do when you need to have the ignition on for a long time without running the engine is to disconnect the coil feed.
I assume that you have a pre-engaged type of starter motor, which has the start solenoid mounted on it. You have fitted the repaired motor and it does not turn the engine over? Are there two small flat terminals on the starter solenoid? If so one should be 1\4" wide the other about 3\16" wide. The white\red cable should be on the larger of these two terminals. If this is correct, remove the cable and using a short section of wire (better still, one of these remote starter switches with two crocodile clip connections) short between the battery terminal on the starter and this terminal. If the motor\solenoid is functioning this will turn the engine over. Ensure the coil is disconnected, for safety, as the engine may otherwise start up.
If it does not turn over, you still have a motor problem. If it does there is a fault in your starter\ignition switch.

Alec
cheers.gif
 
YMGE,

Welcome to the forum from another cheese head. If the key stuck in the start position, you may want to check out your ignition switch as well as it may have given up the ghost.
 
Thanks for the replys. I checked it out this morning, and I found out there is a problem with the ignition switch. I'll have to look into replacing it tomorrow.

Thanks again!
 
I have a 77 MGB, and one of the first things I did was to toss the OEM sytle distributor and replace it with an older point and condenser style distributor. Much more reliable (in my opinion - yours may vary!).
driving.gif
 
Okay, great news!
But, what was the root cause?
Just posting a problem, having several people diagnosing it, and then merely saying "Voila, it's running!" hardly seems fair. How are we supposed to learn?
Jeff
 
Sorry about that. I'm new at posting things online.

The problem was two-fold. When I had the starter rebuilt, the mechanic reversed the terminals on me (I didn't realize the white and brown went on the larger terminal and the white and green wire went on the smaller one... they fit on both). So I hooked it up as I had taken it off, and this caused the ballast resistor to heat up when the ignition was turned to the "start" position. Secondly, the ignition switch was bad. There was no continuity between the power (brown wire) on the switch with the starter (red/white wire) on the switch. I took it back to the store I had purchased the switch from and it was covered under the warranty.

So I put in the new switch, switched the terminals on the starter, and the car started right up. It was a beautiful sound to say the least.

Thanks again, everyone.
 
yep.... second that. Appears from his previous post it was the switch but detailed confirmation helps us all learn.

Glad you got it going.
 
No worries. Had similar stuff happen to me where body people hooked up right headlight backwards so it was on bright when left one was on dim. Not only did they do it they had to work at it as there is a plastic fitting to hold the wires so they had to yank the wires of of the holder rather than just pull the holder off. After comparing to the other light (lucky to have one to compare or I might not have figured it out) I reversed them and all was well.

Got to feel good to get it squared away and guess you are fortunate there was no further damage.
 
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