I have been trying to get my daughters car to start, it is getting no spark. I checked the voltage to the coil and with the key on I get voltage to both sides of the coil. When I turn the key to start the negative side flashes as the engine turns over. I bought a new coil pluggged in the wires and still I am getting no spark. I just laid the new coil beside the old one to test it. For some reason does it have to be mounted for it to work. Also as I crank over the engine I can smell gas so I know if I had spark it should run. I also have replaced the spark plug wires.

 

Did you try to either remove a spark plug wire from the plug and put in a spare plug and with it grounded turn the engine over and see if you get spark. If you have an inductive timing light you can do a similar test without removing the spark plug wire and see if the light flashes. If you get +12V at the coil you should get spark to the plugs. The other area to consider is the crank sensor which is at the top of the flywheel.

 

I took off the wire from the distributer to the coil and checked for spark there. I laid the wire about a half inch from metal and cranked and no spark from the coil wire. I didn't check the spark plugs because I thought I had to have spark there in order for it to get to the distributer and then to the spark plugs. This doesn't make sense to me that I could be getting solid 12 volts on one side of the coil and then the flashing/intermintent 12 volts to the other side and still I am getting no spark out of the coil to distributer wire.