My Wife lives in another City in my other House. She called and said the Car would not move. That was in the morning and I told here I could not come out till the next day.
I called here later and questioned her more closely and found she said there was a clicking when she turned the Key but it was not cranking (not in those words).

I went there the next day expecting a Battery or Electrical issue. Put the Battery on the Charger and later the Engine cranked fine but no start. I had a previous issue on my other vehicle where I had bought some Fuses from the 99 Cent store as I had been doing for years but the quality of the plastic was poor on them and some of bodies of the fuses melted breaking the circuit; specially on the ignition circuit.

So I pulled all of the fuses and checked them. That turned out to be the wrong thing to do because pulling out the ECM/Computer Fuse clears any stored codes.

However, I did find 2 fuses that looked as if they had only a bit on been overheated. I have a bag at home with better quality fuses but did not have it with me so replacing them was going to have to wait.

You could hear the Fuel Pump running but I had my Wife crank the Engine while I sprayed in a bit of Starting Fluid. If it attempts to start like that you know your are not getting fuel in the normal manner. If is does nothing like that you know you are not getting Ignition.

My Manuals were also at home so with the need for the Fuses and the Manuals I came back the next day with those and my Electrical Stuff bag, meter and timing light.

I needed to locate which fuses went to the Ignition but that was not clearly labeled but following the wiring digamma it it was either the ECM or the Gauge Circuit. So I replaced those fuses but it did no good. I replaced all of the fuses anyway but it did no good.

I spent a bit of tie with the wiring diagram locating which was the power wire that went to the Coil. I had trouble getting the Meter to make good contact on the thin prongs but eventually found the Coil was getting the proper voltage.

Note I had previously relocated the coil from where it is unseen between the Engine and the Fire Wall and under the Manifolds (engine mounted transversely). So this time it was easy to remove the Coil.

There was a poor surprise waiting for me. The Chilton Manual showed 3 different Coils. Listed as Coil 1,2,or 3. 2 of the Coils looked the same to me. However, the positions you hooked the meter up to test were not the same and the holes were too tiny to get the meter probes in.
Also the pictures were line drawings. I have seen other manuals where the line drawings missed some detail. Anyway I got no help there.

I vaguely remembered that my Van (what I drove there with) may have the same coil. So I spent some time on the internet checking part numbers and sure enough the Van and the Cavalier have the same Coil.

Removing the Van "dog house" was added work. While I was doing that I figured out that there was enough room for me to connect the Cavalier Coil and use a Jumper Cable to ground the Coil. I did that and the Caviler Coil ran my Van fine. So the Coil was good but now what?

Electrically that left the Ignition Module and the Hall Effect device. Neither of which I have any means or knowledge of how to trouble shoot.

i did remove the distributor cap to see if there was anything that could be observed causing an issue but there was not.

I was really tired after all of that and retreated back to my own house in the other city.

After I got back and fed and all nice and relaxed I realized I should have crank the Engine to see if the Distributor was actually rotating.

I got on eBay and priced Ignition Modals. The were around $30. I am also thinking my Hull Effect device is extremely rusty so which is it and do I want to buy both?

At that point I remembered I had seen to me inexpensive rebuilt distributors on eBay and they come with the Hull Effect device and an new module and also if it turned out it was some other issue with the distributor replacing it could do the job.

EBay had a distributor for $44.99 and free shipping. That was the cheapest way to get all of the parts that might be causing the issue and I ordered it.

While I was waiting on it to arrive I was thinking the only thing left would be some issue with the Timing Chain.

The Distributor arrived early. I took it to the other House. I cranked the engine to see if the old distributor was working and it was.

I had some minor issues getting the old one out due to lack of room but I got the new one in and the Engine started and ran fine.

By that time I was again too tired and went home. I will return in 2 days and get out the timing light and I need to come up with some new 15 amp fuses as for testing I had to use a 20 amp one.

Fortunately where my Wife works is about one mile away. However, she complained about here knee hurting during the Walk. So, it was good the Distributor arrived 3 days early.

__________________
84 300D, 82 Volvo 244Gl Diesel