I tried to start my 914 today, after its long winter nap. Unfortunately, it didn't fire up, but some wiring did.

My distributor now looks like this inside:

Click to view attachment

I'm guessing I didn't hook up the wires to the coil correctly (they had fallen off sometime over the winter). Here's what I have:

Click to view attachment

I did triple check those connections versus the wiring diagram, but maybe I should have quadruple checked. Can anyone verify that they are wrong?

Is my distributor repairable? If not, I guess it's time to fork over the cash for the 123.

The bad:
Yes the wires to the coil are backwards.
Black with red wire is the hot from the ignition switch and goes to terminal 15 on the coil.

The good:
It looks like a new set of points and a new condenser should get you back on the road.

Be sure to inspect the black and red wire for heat damage.

Jim

Thanks. I guess I can't read a wiring diagram.

Can I get the points and condenser from FLAPS? I know I couldn't find the cap and rotor anywhere. I think it's a Bosch 050.

Would be a good time to ditch the points and condensor and install an electronic system.

Would be a good time to ditch the points and condensor and install an electronic system.

Bit of a cook up ,you will be fine to replace the points but pertronix 2 is better but you will need to change coils,consider it as its a step ahead.

Is that an illusion, or was that wire run in between, and crushed by, the disty body and the cap...?

Edit: nm, I see what it was doing.

The black wire with purple stripe goes to the tach. The large black wire is the power.

On my 72 the power to the coil is black with red and the tach wire is black with purple.

The purple stripe on my tach wire is so thin it is very hard to see, just looks like the shiny side of the wire.

The wire in the picture looks black and red to me.

The wire diagrams I have show black and red for the power to the coil for 71, 72 & 73, then solid black for 74, 75 & 76.

If the wire going to terminal 1 on the coil in the OP's picture is black and purple then there maybe something else going on. You don't get wires melted in the distributor like that unless they had full 12 volts put to them and you don't normally get 12 volts from the tach wire.

Jim

I suspect the wires were swapped, because I think that's the only thing I screwed with over the winter.

However, note that what looks like a large black wire at the bottom of the picture is actually the green wire that goes to the distributor -- it just has a black sleeve overtop for some reason.

Here's the relevant section of the wiring schematic I have:

Click to view attachment

Based on this, it seems like I did it correctly. What am I misunderstanding?

You connected the ignition hot wire directly to ground through the distributor. I am afraid that from my look it is going to take more than points and condenser as the copper wire that grounds the plate looks fried. The heat of which cooked the condenser wire. Also, is it possible that over the winter you opened the dizzy? How did the coil come unwired

So the striped wire shown in my car is not the same as the purple striped wire shown in the schematic?

Did you by chance unplug the ignition harness wire from the relay plate? Its real easy to plug it in one pin off and cook the wiring. that way even if the wires are connected correctly to the coil the other end will send power to the tach/dist wire.



Don't ask how I know.......




http://www.914world.com/bbs2/index.php?sho...=313104&hl=

I knocked the wires off the coil when I was changing the alternator belt. So it's likely that's what I screwed up. However, I'm not underestimating my ability to do a whole bunch of things wrong!

What year is your car?
Between 73 and 74 the power wire to the coil changed color from black with red stripe to black.

On the tach wire which is black with purple stripe, the purple stripe is very thin and is very hard to distinguish from the black wire, so it often looks like a solid black wire.
While repairing my wiring over the last few weeks I ended up twisting the tach wire so the purple stripe then becomes a spiral line around the wire and I could then tell the wire from a solid black wire.

In your picture the wire to the points side of the coil looks black with red to me, not black with purple.

Jim

I can see the very faint purple stripe black wire connected to the plus side of the coil. In my car black.red is hot I think. You can run a coil with reversed primary polarity. The problem here is the connecting the ignition wire straight to a wire to ground, shown as green in the diagram.

It's a '74, but who knows what's original anymore. I'll have a close look for the purple stripe.

Is there a reason why you don't have a vacuum advance pot on the distributor?

Because it was like that when I bought it. It's got dual Webers with a Bosch 050 distributor.

I still want the 123 distributor, but hopefully I don't have to spend the money this year. Maybe the next group buy.

You're the winner Jim! I basically had to get out a magnifying glass to see a very faint stripe on what looked like the black wire.

I guess I'll get a copy of the '73 wiring diagram too.

Thanks to everyone for all the help! I replaced the points and the condenser today, and it fired right up!

The 050 bosch dizzy is the predecessor of the 009, many hot VW dudes prefer them over the 009. Both are mechanical advance only, made/used for aftermarket dual carb conversions.