I have an '86 F250 with a 460. I just had the engine replaced about a month ago. I drive it daily. About one week ago, it started losing all spark - only for an instant. It would only do it once or twice just after starting to drive. At first, I thought it was just cold. Then I noticed that my tachometer dropped to zero when it happened. One day on the way home from work, it started doing it off and on and off and on and off. It finally just died. I was able to get it started and get it home. Since then, nothing. I replaced the ignition control module - nothing. I replaced the coil - nothing. The distributor was replaced with the engine, so it is brand new. I did check all the wiring and it seems OK. I lifted the distributor cap and had my wife crank it over. It was turning fine. Then, I held the coil wire to the distributor with a rubber wrapped pair of pliers. When I had my wife crank it again, there was no spark from the wire to the top of the center post on the distributor. As soon as she let go of the key, I noticed a spark, and got a little shock. I had her do it again to verify this. Sure enough, just as she let go of the key, the truck tried to fire, a spark shot across the gap between the wire and the distributor post, and I got a nice little shock through the rubber wrapped pliers. So, I replaced the ignition switch on the steering column - still nothing.

I'm much smarter about cheap rubber wrapped pliers, and about my steering column. But, I'm no closer to starting my truck.

Can someone please offer some ideas?

Thanks,

Skimmer

 

did you pull out a spark plug and ground it to see if you got a nice blue spark? My guess is you might need some new wires... or got some defectives ones if you just replaced them

 

Hi skimmer,

what a story......is the engine and/or ignition module properbly connected to the ground?

..it's only a idea....

Jens