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A funny thing happened on the way.....
Hello, all!
A rather strange thing happened to my coil yesterday, and I'm trying to
figure it out. I re-installed the cap (plastic capacitors) on the coil, and
by the time I put the coil in the car, and got to my destination, there was a
fair amount of oil on the cap, and the base of the coil. This may have been
something in the back of the car, although I couldn't find anything, but the
cap does not LOOK like it is leaking....I brought the coil back home, and set
up to see if the cap was ok. here's where the odd behavior began.
The coil ran very well for a few seconds, after which time it began to
"sputter" and the normal 38-42" arcs were reduced to perhaps 10". this lasted
only for a few seconds, and the coil went back to normal. It went in and out
of the "sputter" mode.
The other thing was that the character of the arcs is now quite different.
The usual purple arcs are now very nearly orange, with contacting streamer
being the normal white.
I guess the question is: IF the cap lost oil, are these symptoms possible?
I cleaned the spark gap faces, thinking that it may be dirty/oxidized/pitted
gap faces, but no change in coil behavior...Any thoughts are appreciated!
Thanks!
Chris Walton