Distributor rebuild?

General help and support for your Lindeman through 2010 John Deere crawler
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RacinJason
430 crawler
430 crawler
Posts: 72
Joined: Wed Aug 29, 2012 6:41 am
Location: Spfld, MA/ Corinth, ME

Distributor rebuild?

Post by RacinJason » Sat Jun 30, 2018 2:54 pm

Has anyone replaced the distributor shaft bushing on their Johnny Popper? In my recent post, "12 v cap", or something like that, I started explaining my trials and tribulations, after my 420C died. Yesterday, I started typing a long dissertation, when my computer locked up and I lost it. I have since replaced the 40 engine with another 40C engine which was running fine. However, it didn't want to run, using my previous distributor, and I couldn't reset the points, the shaft wobbled so bad. I had received a new bushing kit, so drove out the old one with a 3/8 bolt. The head damaged about an inch off the bottom of the shaft. No biggie, or so I thought. The new bushing was an extreme press fit, and I didn't want to chance breaking the housing. Then I found out the shaft won't fit into the bushing, anyway. As a former machinist, I know when you press fit a bronze bushing it also closes up the I.D. somewhat. So, not having any precision measuring tools, nor adjustable reamer handy, I reinserted the old bushing, upside down. Voila, no shaft wobble. I set the points, and installed my "rebuilt" distributor. Well, it still won't start. This, with the original cap, new points, condenser, rotor, wires and new 12v. internal resistor coil, running straight off the battery. 12 v. at the pos. coil terminal. I'm writing all this, as I've seen a lot of similar situations posted on this Messageboard. I was going to try the original 6 v. coil, but that might be bad, so I scrounged around and found a 12v. coil off one of my Jeep vehicles. Temporarily hooked it up with alligator clips, (It has proprietary Ford terminals) and started Ol' Johnny up. Had to head back to Springfield, so ordered a new Pertronix ign. and Flamethrower coil. Can't wait to get back to Maine. Maybe the new coil was defective or, maybe the Ford coil is hotter or is supposed to have an external resistor. Looking for ideas and will update when I get it going again! JTP
JD 112, JD 420 C

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