My pickup died going down the road its a 1982 Chevy 250 engine HEI ign . Try to shorten this story up. A buddy came out and helped me we ended up pulling the distributor from a engine he had to get me home. I thought it was the pickup assembly in my dist so i got a new one and a dist cap. I put it together and it wouldnt hardly start or run . I then pulled another dis from a parts engine but its wiring was not great so i took that out of the one i tryed to fix. Four hours later i was disgusted . I had even pulled the dis from a engine i know ran. This hole time i had been using the new cap and had even switched the coil. So i finely put my old cap on and it ran ok. I dont know what is wrong with the new cap i am returning it today.
Wait till you run into a Ford/Dodge style ignition rotor that the shaft locking tang is off 15* retarded. That will make you scratch your head.
I have lots of stories about new parts that were bad . . . many involving Standard Motor products. Much of the aftermarket automotive products are pretty hit or miss, especially stuff like sensors and such. The key word when trouble shooting involves trying different parts is "Known Good" part. We used to keep good test parts in the bottom drawer for stuff that we dealt with a lot . . .
Aftermarket is loaded with bad out of the box parts and now there is counterfeit own parts too.
long story short but when I worked at the dealership I got sent out to a delimber with regen issues. Because of scheduling issues I was the 3rd tech in 3 days. The first two had each put a burner on. (Built by Bosch) all diagnosing led to a bad burner but I thought what are the odds? Called a manufacturer guru and he told me to put another burner on. I argued because I didn’t want an a** chewing from the shop but he promised to take the heat. Sure enough. Cured the issue. It took 3 brand new burners to get a good one. Later on at training the trainer told us field guys to open the box and shake the burners before we left the shop. If they had any rattles, don’t take them. There was an epidemic of junk burners being sent out.
The new distributor cap came in today its a lot better looking cap its grey the other one was black if it was cracked or had carbon tracking it would have been hard to see. I have not had time to change it yet. I wish i would have messed with the other longer to see if i could have found out the problem.