I'm working on my parts car. It has the original Prest dual point distributor. I cannot get power to go through the distributor. By that I mean there is 12 volts at the + terminal on the coil, 12 volts on negative terminal, then when I hook the wire up to the distributor the voltage drops to less than one volt, points open or closed. I took the breaker plate off to attach the points and condenser, both new. Points open and close, but not simultaneously, there is a time when both are open at once. New wire from coil to distributor. Wire that connects points has continuity. There is no grommet on the coil to distributor wire. There is no ground wire from points to breaker plate, it was broken off. However, if I run a ground while checking for voltage, I still get no voltage. I ran a ground cable from the distributor case to the battery negative terminal. Unhooked condenser, still no voltage.
Looked at the picture in the shop manual, everything seems the same. EXCEPT, I am looking at wire #5 which connects the two points. Clearly that wire connects to the terminal screw at #6. But, on the other side, by the vacuum advance, it seems to drop down a hole. It doesn't seem to be connected to the terminal with the condenser ground and distributor wire. That's where i connected mine.
I'm hoping lack of a ground wire to the base plate doesn't matter, it almost seems overkill.
I'm sure this is clear as mud.
HELP!
I think I can overcome all this by just getting an electronic distributor. I got that in the other Avanti and had no problems.