Dwell Angle

[TerenceD]

My car is running terribly at the moment.  I am trying to tune it up as best as I can to get it to Dan's.

To that end I was trying to read the dwell angle on my 280sl.  

1. I put one wire of the meter to ground and I tried the other wire to the coil
2. I also tried one wire of the meter to ground, and the other wire to the green wire from the condenser.
3. I could not get a wire onto terminal 7 of the ignition junction below the battery (too tight a fit)

The numbers on my guage just bounced around so fast I could not get a reading.  When I hold the wires off the car, into the air, a reading of 59.6 comes up.

I am unsure of how to check the dwell angle in my car ?

I believe the car has several running issues, but I want to start with ignition, to try to get that sorted out as best as I can.  Yesterday I had it running decently, but when I went for a drive, it progressively got worse, so it is back to the drawing board.  Luckily it is a sunny day here and there is a nice breeze.

Thanks,
Terence

[Benz Dr.]

On most cars with CD ( capacitive discharge ) ignition there's a green coil wire. This wire usually goes to a junction box that has a smal metal post near the end of the wire. This is where you connect your positive probe from a dwell meter.

On the earlier cars you just hook on to the positive side of the coil but it won't work on  CD ignition cars.

Dan Caron's
 SL Barn
benzbarn@ebtech.net
 slbarn.mbz.org