Spark, no spark

[Royalwulff24]

Hello everyone. I have a question . I have a 59 cub, this past spring I put a new distributor in it, and everything that goes with it, points, condenser, coil, wires, new power switch, plugs are about a year old. Tuned it up this spring, ran like a top, all summer, ran great, started instantly every time, then it got cold, still started fine, went down this morning, wouldn't start, after trying some other things, I pulled #1 plug, not wet, but very carboned up, cleaned it, out it back in the boot, crank the engine... No spark.. pull #2, it's wet but badly carboned also, same thing, only I got orange spark, for two revolutions then it quit sparking . I have strong snappy blue spark out of my coil, I know I gotta look at the points but is there something in particular I should look for with it giving intermittent spark ?

[Eugene]

I have strong snappy blue spark out of my coil.

Fault is going to be the wire to distributor, and most likely the distributor cap and/or rotor.

Points and condenser are working as the should since you have a hot blue spark from the coil wire.

[Jim Becker]

What type spark plug wires did you use? These tractors normally have wires with solid copper cores. Resistor wires can cause trouble.

[tst]

and black is fuel related, running rich, air cleaner to carb plugged up , check that out also,

[Royalwulff24]

Ok, thank you. I will check and let you know

[Royalwulff24]

Yes I have solid copper core plug wires

[inairam]

I keep writing this but a few years ago I switched over to use only NAPA ignition parts. I have had far fewer ignition issues since

partial list

napa points ECH CS1600
napa Condenser ECH IH200
napa Rotor ECH IH300 battery
napa Cap ECH IH350
napa Plug CHA 549 D18Y ( projected) CHA 502 ( non projects)D21
napa oil; filter 1153
napa VR 6 v VR851
napa coil 6 ECH IC7
napa coil 12 ECH IC14SB

[Royalwulff24]

Thank you, got the weak/no spark issue fixed, still wouldn't start, checked timing, everything was where it should be tdc, took #1 wire off plug, hand cranked engine, it sparked about 1/8" past what the manual calls #1 mark, I marked it with a pencil and tried it 2 more times to make sure, Does that mean it needs retarded to get it to spark when it's supposed to , and if that's the case, is CCW retarding , and CW advancing ? Thank You in advance