i need help with my 1990 camry no spark

[nimainewman]

i have been messing with this darn car for a month now and still no luck it just died on me one day while idling started a couple of times after but just dies. I checked for spark and nothing, i am getting fuel but no spark (will your car die while running if there is a spark problem) I have replaced the whole distributer coil and ignitor , it seems i am getting proper voltage into my coil there are two wires that come from the igniter and go into the top of my coil (this is an external coil) one of the wires is white one is black when the key is in the on positon the white wire reads 12 volts and the black wire reads nothing. someone told me that bolth of those wires need to have 12 volts to the coil or will not send any spark out of the coil to the distributer, i also heard that the white should have 12 volts but the black is a negative and shouldent read any voltage DO ANY OF YOU KNOW WHAT THOSE WIRES DO EXACTLY. some one said to cut the black wire and hook it directly to a 12 volt power source and try to see if i get spark.

[toyomoho]

I can’t find the wiring colors you stated. In order to produce a spark, coil DC power must be turned off. It is then turned on again to saturate the coil. On cars with a distributor point system, the points turned the coil off/on. On cars with electronic systems the igniter does the job. Some cars have coil DC power coming directly from the ignition switch (plus side of coil) with the negative side of coil controlled by the igniter.

One side of the coil should have 12V DC the other side is not grounded but is controlled by the igniter or distributor points.

Try removing the coil wire from the distributor then checking for spark as you crank the engine. If no spark the engine will die.

If you can, download the Gen_2 ignition section from the service manual at the link below.

http://oregonstate.edu/~tongt/camry

Also do a Google search on ignition systems, the all work about the same way.

[atobe]

get the service manual at camrymanuals.com it'll tell you what wires do what

[nimainewman]

i serched all tose manuals and wiring diagrams and couldent really find the exact things i was looking for it is really driving me crazy the only two wires that go into my coil are coming from the igniter one white the other black the white has twelve volts when the key is in the on position but the black never reads nothing no matter what i do some one told me to cut the black wire and hook it directly to 12 volts and see if i get spark out of the coil wire but someone else said no way that black wire is ground do not hook it up to 12 volts any ideas the gen 2 manual is very helpful but i just cant find the info i am looking for

[marc780]

May i suggest a different approach, it sounds like you are unsure if you are getting spark or not. Here's why i think this, if you are not getting spark, it would not start and run AT ALL even for a second, you would just crank and crank and the engine would not even hint at starting. So it may be fuel related after all, just a wild guess.
Another thing, spark is not an " full off-full on" like a light switch, on modern cars anymore, with all the electronic sensors. relays etc. I submit that it is possible you just may not be doing the right thing to trigger spark that you can see for a test!
Also if i had all the money back for all the perfectly good coils i changed in my life - in 30 years of working on cars i have never seen one go bad, but i have seen alot of em get changed in desperation. The coil is probably the very LAST thing to suspect.

Some other possible problem areas - broken distributor shaft (not likely; but it happened to me once, the give away is if you can spin the distributor rotor by hand - you should not be able to). Worn out distributor cap and rotor. Worn out distributor. One or more dead spark plugs. Loose or broken ground wire to chassis.

I'd try this, put everything back together. Get a can of starting fluid. Per the can try to get it engine to run on the starting fluid. If you can do it, even for several seconds only, your problems may be: clogged fuel filter, very dirty injectors, 1 or more fuel injectors dead, dying fuel pump; dirty throttle body or worn out butterfly contact area inside throttle body allowing too much air.

[nimainewman]

you have given me some really good ideas let me tell you a couple more things about the car when this problemstarted the car was runing and it started to die like it was out of gas and then it did die the gas gauge said 1/2 tank but i put gas in it anyway and tied to start but it would not start, so to me it seemed to me like fuel so i bought new filter and replaced it no luck dident do a thing so then i checked for spark and couldent find any spark out of the plug wires so i opened the distributer and the wires that went to the magnets 3 of them the wires were all cracked and messed up looking i thought for sure this was my problem i went to the junk yard and bought a distributer that looked in much better shape and replaced the whole distributer and cap and that dident do a thing so i went and bought a new / used ignitor and coil replaced those and nothing after all this i am not finding any spark out of the coil or out of the plugs however when i turn the key to the on position not the cranking position right when it goes to the on position i here a relay click and i get really good spark out of the coil but when i crank it nothing i dont think it is fuel when i crank it i smell very strong gas and i cracked the top bolt and turned it lots of gas comes out

maybe it is fuel but shouldent i get spark when the motor is cranking
should i be geting spark when the key goes to the on position
one other weird thing i did get the car to start a couple times for seconds at a time by leaving the key in the on position for a minute or two and then trying to crank the motor it would start for a second and then die again it only did this a few times
thanks for helping any other info would be very helpful

[Kep]

nimainewman,

Marc780 had some good ideas. Were you able to get the Camry up and running? What did it turn out to be?

Kep