I'm trying to test run a 74 351W in my truck and I do not have the wiring harness installed yet. I want to fire it up by just rigging the wiring temporarily.
I have the + cable hooked up with the positive on the left lug of the solenoid
The right lug is connected to the starter.
I have run a temporary wire from the s terminal to serve as a switch to touch the battery side of the solenoid.
I ran another temporary wire from the bat side of the coil to the battery + post
I connected the distributor wire to the dist side of the coil.
I cannot get the coil to spark at all.
Is this correct????

 

That is correct for a points distributor. Check/replace the condenser. You should be able to open the points with the cap off and see the spark on a plug and wire plugged into the coil.

Without the ballast resistor the coil will overheat quickly. Make sure you cut the power ASAP.

 

I had replaced the dist after pulling it from the other car over a year ago. The points were opening and closing and had been set.
The problem was the points were not conducting to ground because they had some sort of coating on them. All I had to do was run a strip of 1000 grit between them and it fired right up. I'm such a bonehead!
I honestly though Ford had something funky I was missing since I had never wired from a remote solenoid before.
I had replaced the coil with one I found in the catalog at the parts house. It says it does not need an external resistance so I figured it would work for me.
Thanks Eric.

 

I have a related question. What is the voltage to the coil supposed to be after the resistance wire? About 9v or so? I had a friend's truck that needed some serious wire harness repairs. The prior owner(s) had tapped into the resistance wire to power several accessories (like the heater). That wire got pretty hot before I ran it and found the tapped leads coming off it.

I just want to check the coil end to see if it is still working OK. Also is htere a way to wire in a seperate ballast resistor to use instead of the pink resistance wire? I think Dodges used one.
Thanks
Chris