@Rev: king lead..? really..? that's an interesting one..
shouldn't he check all the leads in that case then..?
Yes I did say lead/s. But if you think about the king lead resistance gets added to each leads resistance. So you can fix a bad performing lead by keeping the total resistance within spec. If you want to do it properly Texx has the perfect post where he shows how to test the resistance from the distributor right through through to the leads.
Please note if the shortest lead is failing badly it can have high resistance but when I tested my spark plug leads they followed the usual pattern you would expect that is as the leads get longer the resistance goes up .
About a year ago they were 5.0 5.25 5.95 10.19 ohm so the other day when I changed the king lead I saved a total of 2.75 ohm. I have ngk spec 2-8 ohm cables the 10.19 ohm should be no more than 8 ohm I brought it back to spec by 10.19-2.75 = 7.44 ohm when I changed the king lead and the car came alive. From what I have read 16 ohm is normal and must change at 20 ohms but maybe this includes the distributer resistance as it this does not work for my starlet 15.44ohm leads only ( 10.19+5.25 ohm) was a big problem.
Obviously I should check resistances and change the 10.19 ohm lead and get even better performance but I have been having trouble finding a set that fit my ep82 distributer. I found if you are time poor changing the King lead can get you out of trouble. My plan is to change the longest and the king lead to Australian copper ( with a some shielding ) and hopefully never touch them again.
EDIT : Now have discovered my alternator fuse had grease and dirt on it ; cleaned the contacts and gained 100 rpm. Next have finally replaced all leads with new low resistance ones , much better smoother faster reving and more responsive than my temporary fix.
