No spark and i can only get 5V at the coil.

67Dart273 said
On a side, one of the exchanges above:

Tyler says

That's why when the run side of the ballast fails, since it does all the work, the engine starts as long as the key is in START and sending that full 12v to the coil.

And the OP answers

When I measured the voltage from the terminal and used a screwdriver to jumper the starter relay there was no difference in the voltage at the coil + terminal, so it never switched to the 12V full power voltage that your referring to. Now that i think about it i may be wrong in doing so and actually need someone to turn the key while checking for the switchover in voltage because im not sure if it would actually send the 12v to the coil without the key being physically turned. I haven't dug that deep yet.

If I understand what you did, there, you have to understand something very important about these cars. Jumpering the starter relay is NEVER going to get the 12V bypass to the coil +, because this happens in the ignition switch. Only time this happens is holding the switch to start.

That's why I said I could be wrong about it not showing up seeing as the switch itself wasn't in the correct position. So ill check it again with someone actually turning the switch itself.

nm9stheham said
When you measure low resistance first put the ohmmeter leads directly together and note what the leads alone measure, then subtract that from the resistance reading of the low resistance part.

BTW, a 1.5 ohm ballast resistance won't keep it from starting and running but it will make the spark weaker.

Is the brown wire from the ballast to the coil + coming off of the low resistance side of the ballast?

The brown wire is connected to the bottom right which is the low resistance side of the ballast. Also my meter only showed .1ohms resistance prior to testing the ballast so it would only be 5.5 on top and 1.4 on bottom.

Update: So when measuring the voltage at the + terminal on the coil I had the usual 5.6 volts with the key in the "on" position like before. I had my son turn the key and try to start the car and it only switched over to 8.7volts while trying to start the car.

When testing the arching of the coil by holding the ignitions coil wire next to the blow how frequently should it be arching while turning the key? Arching did happen but it wasn't constant it was one are then a pause for about 2-3 seconds then another arch.