[H. L. Chauvin]

This is what it definitley "cannot" be -- but, very good to know information for emergency, make-shift distributor cap & body repairs while on the highway.

Many years ago I saw a young Model A owner tow his mystery Model A into an elderly shade tree mechanic's yard with: good fire at points, 1/4" fire at coil when points open & closed, & rotor turning; however, when distributor cap & body were assembled on distributor, no fire to plugs.

Shade tree mechanic immediately recognized the problem -- one of the two (2) metal distributor cap bail (clamp) bands broke & was missing -- young owner had clamped the top distributor cap with a wire extending from the broken distributor clamp's rivet holes in the distributor's metal body, over the top of the distributor's bakelite cap, then over to & atttached to the unbroken distributor metal clamp.

After the coil wire was connected in the top center of the distributor cap, (next to the makeshift repair wire), the coil wire fired, jumped sideways, & was grounded by the repair wire used as a makeshift distributor cap clamp; hence, no fire at plugs.

Shadetree mechanic's emergency fix -- instaled a long, small nail where clamp rivet was removed, secured distributor cap with (2) rubber bands -- young owner drove home where he had a few distributors with a few metal unbroken distributor clamps.

H. L. Chauvin