today, after it had rained at night, despite the new wire set. It
was less severe, though. It turned out that the little proturberant
carbon brush in the center of the distributor cap was missing
almost entirely. I brought the cap to the dealer and asked "is this
the way the cap is supposed to look?" The mechanic was quite
surprised that the car ran at all. $12 and a new Bosch red cap
(the old one was aftermarket and white) later, the problem is fixed.
I hope.


Moral of the story: check under the cap, don't just check the outside
for cracks. The wires needed to be changed anyway, so no loss except
my time for diagnosis.


-b.