Re: Not an antique, but I need some help.

[johnyrude200]

A couple of things. The air gap tester is something I use too, but these newer motors should be producing at least a 1/2 inch bright blue spark. If you don’t gap it enough, you may not see any spark at all, or only see a weak spark. Believe it or not, if they aren’t gapped enough, you won’t see the spark get very hot. A tuned up CD ignition will jump that spark easily 3/4 inch. It’ll run at less, but you’re on borrowed time as the ignition system is on it’s way out.

[EDIT]Also make sure you are cranking it over fast enough when evaluating spark strength. If you have the right size socket and adapter, put a screw gun on the crank nut with the plugs out and use the screw gun to turn the motor over. Beats using a rope starter if you don’t have the controls for the electric starter. You can always wire up a bypass start switch through a solenoid, momentary on/off switch, and a positive lead off the solenoid and a negative ground off the motor to the negative terminal of the battery to use the electric starter. You’ll obviously need a positive lead from the battery going to the solenoid, too.[EDIT]

Check for good grounds on your coils and various leads; and make sure the fiber washers and star washers are all present on your ignition system and configured as they should be. Not having these set up as specified OEM, that will lead to problems and chasing ghosts. Check all your connections too between driver coil, sensor, power pack, and ignition coils. Corrosion interferes with things quite a bit.

A 105 compression on one of those 35’s isn’t horrible, but not too good, either. That could account for a stall at low idle (dropping compression).

If the thing is sneezing, refer to what everyone else has said, look for an air leak somewhere. If your rich/lean low speed knob is set a lot higher than it should, than that is a strong indicator that it’s running lean due to an air leak. The air silencer box (the big black plastic box) should say what the default settings are for the slow speed knob. If they’re gone, check a service manual to be sure.

If you richened up the low-speed adjustment needle and now it’s bogging down during acceleration, well now you know you’re running too rich. It should clear out and mid-range even if that’s set wrong. Sounds like an air leak, somewhere, to me. Again – refer to what everyone else has written – all good advice.