Boatyard Find - Running nicely, but coolant bubbling in reserve....

[joelspider]

My son and I just picked up a 1978 Spider for FREE The owner gave us the title and the keys. It turned out to need points. It is running. We changed a few leaky gas lines. After a 3 minute ride, the reserve coolant tank is boiling. The engine sounds great. We changed, the oil, plugs, points, oil filter. We simply added water to the radiator. Seems that the radiator needs to be bled.... In any case, we are happy to have a Spider with a good sounding engine. The price was right

[gchocevar]

Great Deal!

Does the fan come on and what is the temperature gauge reading while the coolant is bubbling to the overflow tank?

Greg

[joelspider]

The fan is on. It has been wired so it runs all of the time. I had an air lock in the radiator. Temp is perfect now. The engine is running well, but just discovered the mechanical advance on the distributor is rusted. I have freed it, but I don't think it will ever be right. Thinking about replacing it with a non-point distributor. Any recommendations? Thanks

[gchocevar]

Joel,

You might want to look at the other posts in regards to a new distributor. My 1979 has a stock pointless distributor. Knock-on-wood it works fine and provides plenty of spark. Maybe someone is upgrading their 1979 or 1980 and you can pick up a used one.

Greg