awalker@topaz.ARPA (*Hobbit*) (01/25/85)
Hmm, I didn't really mean that your points would last *forever* without any care, just that they'd last a lot longer, give you a hotter zap, and not get hopelessly pitted in 10K miles. Sure they require care -- anything that goes through that many mechanical cycles per mile will! Just recently my hacked-up ignition started misbehaving. The symptoms were rough running and the [electronic] tach jumping upward in spurts that the engine's speed could never have generated. The problem? A thin film of oil on the points. Usually, when the points pass all the coil primary current, this film burns away, but not when they're only passing 20 milliamps. The tach thing? The contacts were bouncing, creating the illusion of many firings per opening, confusing the tach. The fix? I ran a piece of paper towel between the points to dry them off, and everything was fine. About that Sears guy and the ''design defect in VW's'': Bovine excreta! I'm sure if you were some grunt working at the Sears auto shop, you'd try the same stupid stunt. Sue the bastards. An oil filter by design is not supposed to explode. It's easy to see where the design fault lies... _H*