Cranks but wont start....

[Lil_Star's 79 Vette]

My 79 Vette now will crank but wont start. It all started when I was coming back from the store. I was at a stop light and the car started stumbling. The next stop light is stalled out and the next (yah a lot of stop lights to get to my house) it stalled twice. I popped it into Netrual and revered it then popped it back into drive. My husband met me down the road and drove it home. It stalled out at the last light and would not start. We pushed it home. We have checked and it has spark (Could be low spark we are still checking into it) and it has gas. We replaced the fuel fitler and the rotor and cap, condeser and the module. But it still wont start. Anybody have any suggestions? I dont want to keep throwing parts at it until we can clue in on whats wrong. I have a show I need to travel to with it and its coming up fast. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

 

[Ripp 73]

Well, I'm not sure I have an answer for you, but I'd like to help you keep this thread near the top so others might be able to see it and help you out.

Let me ask you about how the car sounded when it was stalling out on you. You mentioned when the car was starting to stall you could put the car in neutral and push the RPM's up to keep it running, did the exhaust sound off or out of rhythm? If so, it could be as simple as a cracked porcelain on a spark plug. Have you pulled the plugs to check their gaps and to see how they are burning? If the exhaust sounded the same as normal, the engine could be starving for fuel, so the fuel filter was a good guess.

One other thing that you can easily check, try cranking the Corvette in a dark area and see if you physically see a spark around the spark plugs.

Give us an update on what you have done and tested. Hopefully someone can help.

 

[Lil_Star's 79 Vette]

Well we checked the spark plugs and it was sparking. Come to find out it was the coil. We spoke with a friend from work who use to work for gm. He said to check the coil. We brought it to work and come to find out it was not grounded. There was a piece to ground it that was missing. I bought the car with 11,000 miles on the motor. So whoever put it together after the motor got replaced must have lost it or forgotten about it. So to others please check your coils. It maybe getting spark but it might not be enough. Check to make sure its grounded or it can short out like mine. LoL. Thanks. Hope this helps others. But the car is running great now.