I've gradually been getting my '79 cab back online. We are driving it every day now, but it still is not running quite right. Rough at idle, and short some power compared to my '82. I was fiddling around in the engine compartment this weekend and I had a look at the distributor. Usually I check the mechanical advance as well as the vacume advance. The way I check the mechanical advance is just to give the rotor a twist by hand and watch it snap back. Usually there is a centrifigual mechanism in there with weights that fly out with speed to advance it working against a spring that tends to retard it(or vise versa). Well, my '79 seems to have no spring. The rotor pretty much just flops around. I checked my '82 and it behaves like I expect. I suspect my spring has either broken or come off, and that its time to call M. Anderson & Co. and order a used distrubutor. But I am a bit puzzled...I have seen lots of distributor failures before (on other porsche models), but never quite like this. Is this common on the early cars? Is this a freak occurrance? Could this possibly be normal for this year model?
The 928 int'l catalog I have only lists distributors for '78/'79 models. Is this an indication that these years had a problem and failures are common? Or did they just run out of room on the page.

 

If it is the spring, get the spring. These are not hard to get apart and back together.

The catalog is just the tip of what they have and can get.

 

Unfortunatly no internal parts are available, even from 928 intl. Used distributor is on the way.