Need Help To See if Engine Runs

[JohnnyOcean]

i just bought a 72 gmc as a parts truck to swap the engine, tranny, and some parts into my 67 c10 project....and before i swapthe engine over i'd like to get it started......i only had a few minute to work on it this morning before work so i dropped in a battery and turn the key and nothing happened.....so then i jumped the right side terminal on the starter to the battery and the engine turned.....felt alittle relieved......

now for what i'm gonna do tomorrow......to get it to start do i need to jump a wire from the battery to the hei distributor and jump the terminals on the starter?

what's the best way to get the engine started without using the questionable wiring on the truck?...any advice would be greatly appreciated

[1966gmc]

Run a wire from a ign terminal on your fuseblock to the batt terminal on the HEI.Make sure all your engine grounds are good and 12v cable goin from the pos side of the battery to the starter is good.If not,replace all the cables.I always make sure the grounds are superb because if not,the vehicle will not start and possibly fry wires very quickly

[JohnnyOcean]

what's the batt terminal on the hei...is that the wire on the distributor?..

i think there are a few wiring problems on the truck so i was gonna steer away from using the fuse block

but i'll try it......

in 72 was there a safety on the th400 tranny that allowed you to only start it in park or neutral?...

[hvychve]

if you are just wanting to start engine and dont give a hoot about anything else, I would first turn key on to see if you have power to positive side of coil or battery feed to hei to dist. if ok, no sweat , if not, than just run a wire straight off positive side of battery to battery side of dist. (H.E.I.) or positive side of coil, and yes you can run power to the starter to get it to crank, "S" terminal of starter solenoid. If it had sat for some time, you might want to squirt some gas down the throat of the car, I like to fill the bowl, the vent tubes and a small nozzle tip works good, I usually squeeze two to three ounces in them, open the throttle a few times while looking inside carb, and see if accelerator pump is squirting gas, if so you are good to go there.... after all your jumpers are up and runnning , you might want to check spark at a plug wire while cranking to verify you have ignition, if you do, should start if timing is good and there arent other major issues, good luck

[1966gmc]

There should be 2 terminals on the top side of the Dist cap.The one closest to the firewall is the Batt+,that is the terminal that requires battery voltage while the one in front is for the tach.It should be marked on the cap.